SOME SCIENTIFIC RESULTS 129 



who owned large tracts of timber land on the St. Croix, 

 were the first men he had ever seen to shoot snipe over 

 trained dogs. He had made a study of guns and many 

 letters on the subject passed between himself and Prof. 

 Baird, the latter recommending the Maynard gun which 

 Mr. Boardman used to great satisfaction. He was known 

 from Maine to Florida as the best wing shot of his day. 

 Regarding dogs he had much correspondence with Mr. 

 John Nesbit, Jr., of Cambridge, Mass., who was one of 

 the most famous importers and breeders of setters of his 

 time and Mr. Boardman used to say the reason his own 

 dogs knew so much was because they came from the town 

 where Harvard University was located. 



Throughout Mr. Boardman's long correspondence with 

 naturalists, extending over many years and embracing 

 hundreds of letters, only a single instance occurs in 

 which he expresses any desire for personal recognition. 

 This occurs in a letter to Prof. Robert Ridgway written 

 from Calais, December 8, 1884, in which he presents 

 that naturalist with a skin of Falco columbarius, from 

 Florida. From that letter the following extract is made : 



I do not know as I should have written again so soon only 

 you said you would return the skin ; but if it is so unique a speci- 

 men and among your great numbers have none like it, the right 

 place for it is the United States Museum, as you might want it for 

 purposes of comparison. I did not suppose you could make a new 

 race from one specimen and do not remember as I said anything 

 about race. But I described this in such a way that if it should 

 prove different when you get other skins with which to compare it 

 before others may do so, as to be ahead and call it Boardman's 

 Pigeon Hawk. I have been sending lots of queer specimens to 

 Washington ever since Kennicott's time and if I have found one 

 which you can call for me I shall be well paid. 



