Linnean Society. 421 
ciety,’ and the ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle.’ Mr. Wedgewood was held 
in great esteem as a man of high moral worth and amiable and ge- 
nerous disposition. He was born about March 1766, and died on 
the 26th of January 1844. 
‘The Society has also lost by death three of its Foreign Members. 
Richard Harlan, M.D., was of Quaker parentage and born in the 
city of Philadelphia about the year 1795. He studied medicine under 
Dr. Joseph Parrish, one of the surgeons of the Pennsylvania Hospital, 
whose anatomical assistant he became, dissecting extensively him- 
self and directing the dissections of the younger pupils. In 1817, at 
which time he was settled in practice, he had already commenced 
the study of comparative anatomy with zeal and success; and there 
is reason to believe that his devotion to natural history interfered 
greatly with the brilliant prospect that was opened to him as a me- 
dical practitioner. But he had made his choice, and was quite pre- 
pared to sacrifice fortune and professional eminence to his favourite 
pursuit. As early as 1819 he delivered a course of lectures on Com- 
parative Anatomy at the Philadelphia Museum (Peale’s), where he 
had amassed a considerable stock of materials for demonstration, but 
the attendance was small, and he gave up lecturing in disappoint- 
ment. 
About this period the return of MacLure to the United States, 
accompanied by Lesueur, gave a new stimulus to the eultivation of 
natural history, and the complete establishment of the Academy of 
Natural Sciences of Philadelphia under the Presidency of MacLure 
brought together the most distinguished names in tle science that 
America had produced. Among Dr. Harlan’s claims to remembrance, 
not the least are derived from his zeal in the early constitution of 
this Society, and from his example of sedulous devotion to its pur- 
suits. To the pages of its Journal he contributed numerous yalu- 
able papers. 
In 1825 he published his ‘ Fauna Americana ; being a Description of 
the Mammiferous Animals inhabiting North America,’ a work partly 
compiled from Desmarest’s ‘ Mammalogie’ and from other less- 
known publications, but containing in addition much useful original 
matter. 
In 1832, when the Asiatic cholera made its first appearance at 
Quebec and Montreal, considerable apprehension was excited in the 
public mind, and Dr. Harlan was appointed by the City Councils of 
Philadelphia one of a Commission of three, consisting of himself, Dr. 
Jackson and Dr. Meigs, to proceed to Canada, ‘‘ to inquire into the 
origin, nature, progress, &c. of the prevailing epidemic.” After making 
extensive inquiries, the Commission returned to Philadelphia with 
such a mass of information on the subject as enabled them to give to 
the people of that city ample warning of the nature of the premonitory 
symptoms and of the precautions to be adopted, and thereby greatly 
to mitigate the severity of the disease and to reduce the number of 
its victims. For his tripartite share in this service Dr. Harlan re. 
ceived a handsome gratuity from the municipal authorities, together 
with a piece of silver plate bearing an inscription in record of its 
