BoranicareG 
Vou, XI. JANUARY, 1886. No. 1. 
Asa Gray. 
BY CHARLES R. BARNES. 
(WITH PLATE A.) 
Asa Gray was born in Sauquoit, Paris township, Oneida Co., 
N. Y., on the 18th of November, 1810. His father had been ap- 
prenticed to a tanner and currier and must have been still work- 
ing at the trade when this eldest child was born, for the little 
house which was his home stood on the tannery premises, and 
where his father established a tannery. Here the monotonous 
oceupation of feeding the bark-mill and driving the old horse 
that turned it was assigned to the child. 
His schooling began at the age of three years, and at six or 
seven he was a champion speller in the numerous “‘ matches ” that 
enlivened the district school. Later, he attended, for a year or 
two, a “ select ” school taught at Sauquoit by the village pastor’s 
son, and at twelve or thereabouts he was sent to the Clinton 
Grammar School. Here he stayed two years. His summer va- 
cations were spent in the hay or corn-fields, for his father had 
begun to buy up the Jand cleared by the Furnace Co. for char- 
coal, and to turn his attention to farming. After leaving the Clin- 
ton school he went, in October, 1825, to the academy at Fairfield, | 
mt 
Herkimer Co., seven miles north of Little Falls, where he re- 
