

Miscellaneous Intelligence. 141 



either fitting or needful. But in this case, justice requires that his mem- 

 ory should be retrieved from the mistaken judgment of a hasty inquest, 

 by a simple statement of the particulars of the melancholy occurrence, 

 as they have been carefully collected by a friend of the deceased, and 

 communicated to the writer of this notice. It appears, in brief, that 

 Mr. Oakes had been unwell during the previous week ; that he was oc- 

 casionally subject to sudden attacks of vertigo ; that he was indisposed 

 and took no breakfast on the morning of the 31st, but left for Boston in 

 an early train of cars to arrange some business there, and return if pos- 

 sible by the eleven o'clock train ; that he was much exhausted by walk- 

 ing and by the heat of the day ; that he stopped, only a few minutes be- 

 fore the starting of the ferry-boat, at a store near the head of the 

 wharf leading to the depot,, to purchase some shot for gunning; that, 

 although he had but a few moments to spare, he took particular pains 

 and trouble to select the two sizes of shot which he was accustomed to 

 use, taking six pounds of one sort and four of another ; that, the bell 

 ringing while he was making his purchase, he hurried with it to the de- 

 pot ; that he there met the gentleman whom he came to Boston to see, 

 and received from him the answer he had been led to expect in regard 

 to a business transaction between them, and which precluded all pecu- 

 niary anxiety ; that he hastily tied up his two packages of shot in his 

 pocket handkerchief, hung it upon his arm, for convenient carriage, 

 and stepped on board the boat just as it was leaving ; that, soon after 

 the boat was out of the dock, he was observed standing or sitting at the 

 stern, which was unprotected by a barrier, and the next moment he 

 was seen in the water, where he sank before any effectual means could 

 be used for his rescue. Under these circumstances there is every rea- 

 son for believing that, in his exhausted stale, he was seized with sudden 

 famtness or vertigo, and fell overboard from the stern of the boat ; an 

 accident which was the more likely to occur, from the fact that he was 

 very heavy, and awkward in his movements. 



It is manifest from what has already been remarked, that Mr. Oakes's 

 services to American botany, are not to be measured by the amount of 

 his actual publications. These consist, principally, of a Catalogue of 

 the Plants of Vermont, contributed to the " History of Vermont, Natu- 

 ral, Civil, and Statistical," by Zadock Thompson ; and of two or three 

 articles contributed to Hovey's Horticultural Magazine, comprising de- 

 scriptions of new plants of New England, or notices of new localities, 

 detected by himself or his friend Dr. Robbins. These are but small 

 indications of what he might have accomplished. But there are few 

 botanists in this country who are not indebted to him, directly or indi- 

 rectly, for some portion of their knowledge, or for some of the finest 

 specimens in their herbaria ; and there is no treatise, and scarcely 

 a n article on the botany of the Northern States, published within the 

 'ast twenty years, to which he has not in some way essentially contri- 

 buted. The immense collections of most beautiful specimens, which he 

 roade with peculiar skill, were never hoarded, but were freely bestow- 

 ed upon every botanist, upon every amateur indeed, who desired, or 

 who could appreciate them. When they accumulated in large quanti- 

 ties upon his hands, it was only because he was not yet prepared to 

 distribute them in the form which seemed most fitting, nor yet able to 



