144 AN HISTORICAL SKETCH. 



have seen at a funeral was a handful of tansy gathered 

 from the garden or roadside and thrown upon the coffin. 



The Essex County Natural History Society has not be- 

 come extinct, although its name was given up when it was 

 merged in the Essex Institute, which includes both those 

 who ^study the wonders of nature and those whose tastes 

 lead them to search out the events of the past. 



The Essex Institute was formed by the union of the 

 Essex Historical and the Essex County Natural History 

 Societies. To effect this end the two societies held sev- 

 eral meetings during the autumn of 1847. A joint com- 

 mittee was appointed to draft a plan to serve as a basis of 

 organization. The plan offered by the committee was 

 accepted by the societies at a meeting Jan. 14, 1848. 

 An Act of Incorporation, fronj the Legislature, was ob- 

 tained in February of the same year ; and on the first of 

 March following, by its acceptance, the Essex Institute 

 was organized and the following officers chosen : Daniel 

 A. White, President ; John G. King, John Lewis Russell 

 and John C. Lee, Vice Presidents ; Henry Wheatland, 

 Secretary and Treasurer; Frederic Howes, jr., Cabinet- 

 keeper ; George D. Phippen, Librarian ; Frederic Howes, 

 Joseph G. Waters and Matthew A. Stickney, Curators of 

 the Historical Department ; William Mack, Henry F. King 

 and Samuel P. Fowler, Curators of Natural History ; 

 Benjamin H. Silsbee, Francis Putnam and James Upton, 

 Curators of the Horticultural Department ; John C. Lee, 

 Frederic Howes and Ephraim Emmerton, Financial Com- 

 mittee, 



My esteemed and somewhat eccentric friend, the Rev. 

 John Lewis Russell, a learned and enthusiastic botanist, 

 when the union of the two societies was under considera- 

 tion, expressed to me his fears that the subject of natural 



