PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 67 



Sciences, where he made his bed beneath the skeleton of a 

 horse, and fed himself upon bread and milk. He was wont, we 

 are told, to regard eating as an inconvenient interruption to sci- 

 entific pursuits, and to wish that he had been created with a hole 

 in his side, through which his food might be introduced into his 

 system. He built up the museum of the society, and made 

 extensive contributions to biological science. 



His article on conchology, published in 1816 in the American 

 edition of Nicholson's Cyclopaedia, was the foundation of that 



* 



science in this country, and was republished in Philadelphia in 

 1819, with the title, ''A Description of the Land and Fresh- 

 water Shells of the United States." 



" This work." remarked a contemporary, " ought to be in the 

 possession of every American lover of Natural Science. It has 

 been quoted by M. Lamarck and adopted by J/. de Ferrusac, 

 and has thus taken its place in the scientific world." 



Such was fame in America in the year of grace 1820. 



In 1817 he did a similar service for systematic entomology, 

 and his contributions to herpetology, to the study of marine 

 invertebrates, especially the Crustacea, and to that of invertebrate 

 paleontology, were equally fundamental. 



As naturalist of Long's expeditions he described many Western 

 vertebrates, and also collected Indian vocabularies, and it is 

 said that the narrative of the expeditions was chiefly based upon 

 the contents of his note-books. 



In 1825 he removed from Philadelphia to New Harmony. In- 

 diana, and, in company with Maclure and Troost, became a 

 member of the community founded there by Owen of Lanark. 

 Comparatively little was thenceforth done by him, and we can 

 only regret the untimely close of so brilliant a career.* 



* See Memoirs by B. H. Coates, read before American Philosophical 

 Society, Dec. 16, 1834. Memoirs by George Ord; also a tribute to his 

 memory in Ball's presidential address before the Society in January, 1888 



