December 6, 1912] 



SCIENCE 



781 



the Swiss university at ISTeufcliatel, until in 

 1846, when he came to this country, and was 

 soon made professor in the Lawrence Scien- 

 tific School, Harvard University. Here he 

 has done distinguished service to natural his- 

 tory, and has heen continuing the great lahors 

 of his life. A large cahinet has grown up 

 around him, where he is buried in a multitude 

 of special and general investigations, which 

 unfortunately he rarely puts in form for pub- 

 lication, leaving scores of important re- 

 searches and discoveries quite unrecorded. 

 He much needs collaborators and reporters, to 

 save his labors from oblivign. Among other 

 herculean toils, he is maturing, and will in 

 time present to the world, the broadest and 

 completest classification of animated nature 

 wliich has been made. From such a man was 

 the discourse by the retiring president, this 

 year, to have come, had not ill health pre- 

 vented his attendance. We have doubtless 

 thus been deprived of some of those exhilara- 

 ting generalizations and enthusiastic bursts 

 which so characterize his genius and indicate 

 its superiority to the mere talent of the ordi- 

 nary investigator or descriptive naturalist. 



The president now officiating, and who pre- 

 sided at Cleveland, is Professor Benjamin 

 Peirce, of Harvard University. As we look 

 on his floating locks, furrowed brow, thin face 

 and figure, and especially his clear, deep eye, 

 it is not difficult to recognize the first Amer- 

 ican mathematician and physical astronomer. 

 His mind plays football with transcendental 

 functions, and runs algebraic gauntlets with 

 a facility scarcely inferior to that of Cauchy, 

 the preeminent mathematician of France, who, 

 declining to swear by Louis Napoleon, was a 

 few months since ejected from his government 

 professorship in Paris. (Why will not some 

 millionaire invite M. Cauchy to America, pro- 

 viding for him as Mr. Abbott Lawrence did 

 for Professor Agassiz?) Professor Peirce is 

 an excellent refutation of the usual slip-shod 

 idea of a mathematician. He is a most inter- 

 esting, earnest and cultivated gentleman, of 

 marked kindliness and geniality, and excel- 

 lent company for any man of sense. Scarcely 

 could a less genial man so long make part of 



that most high-toned, refined and cultivated 

 circle of college society in Cambridge, without 

 at least an external exhibition of the humani- 

 ties of culture and of life. So fully has the 

 professor president mastered the perturbations 

 of the planets, that he may be said to have put 

 these wanderers under centennial bonds to 

 keep the peace. When the world was all agog 

 with Le Verrier's discovery of Neptune, 

 through the perturbations of Uranus, Pro- 

 fessor Peirce publicly declared that the planet 

 discovered was not the planet called for by Le 

 Verrier's theory; a bold saying that was, and 

 we then thought a rash one, but he was quite 

 right, as the daily confirmation of the lamented 

 Walker's Ephemeris fully proves. Once, too, 

 he was wrong; but when he found his error 

 he was prompt to confess and disclaim it as 

 publicly as possible: a nobler thing than con- 

 victing Le Verrier of oversight. Professor 

 Peirce has long been a sort of backbone to the 

 physical astronomy of the country, as has of 

 late been shown in his services to the new 

 Nautical Almanac; and we hope he may long 

 survive to fill this post of labor and of honor. 

 At the fourth meeting, the only salaried 

 ofiieer of the association, that of permanent 

 secretary, was created, and a salary of $300 

 per annum established, the term of oflice being 

 three years. Professor Spencer F. Baird, of 

 Dickinson College, Pennsylvania, now the 

 Natural History Secretary of the Smithsonian 

 Institution, was chosen to this new post. His 

 duty includes arranging for reports of pro- 

 ceedings, the issuing of circulars to members, 

 nearly all the current correspondence, and the 

 charge of publishing and distributing the vol- 

 umes of proceedings. The smooth working of 

 the business matters of the association de- 

 pends very much on the skill and fidelity with 

 which the duties of this ofiice are discharged; 

 and it is fortunate that one so competent in 

 every respect was chosen to it. Professor 

 Baird was a favorite pupil and intimate friend 

 of Audubon, and has made special attainments 

 and copious collections in ornithology and 

 ichthyology, besides a general study of natural 

 history. With a physical and mental vigor 

 developed in collecting specimens, and stiU 



