Klem—The History of Science in St. Louis. 97 
was presented by Mr. Harrison’s widow to the Smith- 
sonian Institution, where it now is as the George Catlin 
Indian Gallery of the United States National Museum. 
In the early part of the nineteenth century the chief 
object of every ambitious and thoughtful explorer was to 
secure for the world as complete a catalog of its plants 
and animals as possible. The still unknown regions of 
the New World, particularly those of the trans-Missis- 
Sippi country with their primitive races, which had not 
yet been contaminated by civilization, their beasts of 
prey, brilliantly plumed birds and unkonwn plants, of- 
fered a splendid field for research. Even persons of 
royal lineage heard this call of the new world. Alex- 
ander Philip Maximilian,’ Prince of Wied-Neu-Wied, 
visited North America in 1833, making a scientific ex- 
ploration of the trans-Mississippi region. He was ac- 
companied by a young Swiss artist, Charles Bodmer, who 
painted primitive landscapes and portraits of the aborig- 
ines, 
Tarrying briefly in Boston, New York and Phila- 
delphia, he visited the Moravians at Bethlehem and spent 
the winter of 1832-33 on the banks of the Wabash, in the 
communistic settlement of Robert Owen, where he found 
a good library of Americana and of natural history. 
Early in 1833 he made the journey to the mouth of the 
Ohio and up the Mississippi, arriving in St. Louis before 
the departure of the usual spring caravans of the western 
fur traders. 
While in St. Louis Maximilian was invited by General 
Clark to accompany a deputation of Sauk and Fox In- 
dians, headed by Keokuk, on a visit to the imprisoned 
chief, Black Hawk, at Jefferson Barracks. He was partic- 
ularly interested in the many species of birds and butter- 
15 Thwaites, R. G. Travels in the interior of North America. By 
Maximilian, Prince of Wied. 1843. Early Western Travels 1748-1846. 
22-24. 1904. 
Spaulding, Perley. A biographical history of botany at St. Louis, 
Missouri. Pop. Sci. Month. 1909: 50-52 
