362 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1904. 



age would care to follow to-day unless quite regardless of his reputa- 

 tion. But such was the condition of knowledge at that time. In 1831 

 he entered upon the practice of medicine, and soon after received the 

 appointment of surgeon and botanist to the expedition under School- 

 craft for the discovery of the sources of the Mississippi. His public 

 career as a scientific man began, therefore, with that date. 



Houghton is described by his biographer as a man of rather small 

 stature, with hands and feet small and delicately formed; head large 

 and well developed; with blue eyes, well sheltered underneath massive 

 brows, and showing upon his ears, nostrils, and mouth scars from an 

 accidental explosion of powder, which took place during some of his 

 boyish experiments. In early life he had suffered severely from a 

 hip disease which had left one leg a little short, though not sufficiently 

 so to cause him to limp. His temperament was warm and nervous; 

 his movements quick and earnest. Young, ardent, and generous to a 

 fault, he seems to have made friends wherever he went, and soon 

 became the most prominent and popular man in the State. 



Everywhere his ability and energy were acknowledged. No name throughout the 

 distant and rural districts was so often uttered. His daring, his generous acts, his 



g 1 humor, his racy stories were repeated everywhere. * * Every man 



seemed to feel a pride in the growing celebrity of Houghton, and the familiar epi- 

 thets "The little doctor," " Our Doctor Houghton," " The boy geologist of Michi- 

 gan," became common throughout the State. 



"Alvah Bradish, Memoir of Douglass Houghton, Detroit, 1889. 



