JOHN AMORY LOWELL. 1 



John Amory Lowell died at his residence in Boston, on 

 the 31st of October last, when he had almost completed the 

 eighty-third year of his age, for he was born on the 11th of 

 November, 1798. A few years of his boyhood — from 1803 

 to 1806 — were passed in Paris, where he was a spectator of 

 some of the glorifications of the First Empire, especially on 

 the occasion of the return from Austerlitz. He entered Har- 

 vard College in 1811, Messrs. Sparks, Parsons, and Palfrey 

 being among his classmates, and after graduation he entered 

 a mercantile house. He was elected into this Academy on the 

 10th of November, 1841, at the same time with two other 

 Fellows assigned to the botanical section. One was William 

 Oakes, of Ipswich, who died seven years afterward ; to the 

 other is assigned the duty of preparing this memorial. When 

 the Fellows of the Academy were arranged in classes and sec- 

 tions, the pronounced tastes inherited from his father and culti- 

 vated by his own studies made it natural that he should belong 

 to the small section of botany. But he might with equal pro- 

 priety have been relegated to more than one section of the 

 third class. For, notwithstanding his devotion to business 

 affairs, his classical and linguistic knowledge were always 

 w r ell kept up, and his authority upon eeonomical and financial 

 questions was great. 



The family has always had a marked representation in this 

 Academy. To mention only the direct line, the subject of 

 our notice was chosen into it very shortly after tin- death of 

 his father, — the John Lowell who, after achieving distinctioo 

 and a competency at the bar, retired from active practice at 

 the age of thirty-four, to be known through his valuable writ- 

 ings as u The Norfolk Farmer," and as a principal promoter, 



1 Proceedings American Academy of Aits and Science, xvii. 408. 

 (1882.) 



