162 THE RETROSPECT OF THE YEAR. 



Messrs. Morris & Co., merchants at Shanghai, where he 

 died on the nineteenth of October, 1886, leaving a wife 

 and three children residing in Salem. Admitted to mem- 

 bership in the Institute Aug. 9, 1865. 



JOSEPH BASSETT HOLDER, curator of the American 

 Museum of Natural History in New York, N. Y., died in 

 that city on Tuesday, Feb. 28, 1888. He was the son of 

 Aaron L. and Rachel (Bassett) Holder, and was born in 

 Lynn, Mass., Oct. 26, 1824. He was descended on the 

 mother's side from the Bassetts, a well-known family in 

 Lynn, from the early settlements. The Holders were also 

 among the early Friends or Quakers. The immediate an- 

 cestor was Christopher Holder who came from Alverton, 

 Co. of Gloucester, England, arriving in Boston, July 27, 

 1656. The different branches settled in and about Boston. 

 In 1700, one of his ancestors built a house on the corner 

 of Nahant and Sagamore streets, which has been owned 

 and occupied by several generations of this family. 



He was educated in the Harvard Medical School, and in 

 1846 began the practice of medicine in Swampscott, 

 Mass., and later removed to Lynn and became the city 

 physician. From his youth he was an ardent lover of na- 

 ture, and devoted much time to its study and research, 

 and took much pleasure in encouraging a like taste among 

 the people. He was an ardent botanist and prepared a 

 list of the plants of Essex county and left copious notes 

 of their habits, times of appearance and kept what might 

 be called a diary of plant life. He also made a catalogue 

 of the birds of Lynn and vicinity, which appeared as Bul- 

 letin No. 1, of the Publications of the Lynn Natural His- 

 tory Society. This led to his meeting Professor Baird 

 and the formation of a lifelong acquaintance. He early 

 met Professor Agassiz and visited him at his house in Na- 



