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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIII. No. 1101 



chase of the important collections which 

 formed the foundation of its present strong 

 departments of mammalogy and ornithology. 

 He has in later days shown his keen interest 

 in its welfare through valuable gifts and ap- 

 preciated advice. 



On the occasion of his eightieth birthday, 

 the A m erican Museum made public recogni- 

 tion of liis services through the publication 

 of a brief biographical sketch of Dr. Elliot 

 with portraits of him at the age of thirty 

 years, at sixty-four (when curator of zoology 

 at the Field Museum), and at eighty, and pre- 

 sented him with an engrossed memorial signed 

 by the full scientiiic staff of the museum, giv- 

 ing him " greeting with grateful recognition 

 and appreciation " of his services " as an ex- 

 pert adviser of the museum in its early days."' 

 A few months later he was elected to the board 

 of trustees, from which his sudden removal by 

 death is regarded as a great loss to the insti- 

 tution. 



Dr. Elliot was not without further special 

 honor in his home city. On March 24, 1914, 

 the Linnsean Society of New York held a din- 

 ner in his honor in recognition of " his umique 

 attainments in mammalogy and ornithology," 

 at which the society presented him with its 

 Linnsean medal of honor, the second occasion 

 of the presentation of this medal. Dr. 

 Elliot's speech of acceptance was in his char- 

 acteristically graceful and happy vein. It was 

 soon after published by the society as a special 

 brochure. 



Dr. Elliot was a man of striking personality, 

 dignified and reserved in manner, conserva- 

 tive yet broadminded, constant and sympa- 

 thetic in his personal friendships. His career 

 was one of ceaseless activity in his lines of 

 special research, and he has left many monu- 

 ments to lighten the way of those who may 

 follow in his footsteps. He fell into no ruts 

 of routine that materially hampered his prog- 

 ress. On leaving England he was naturally 

 deeply embued with the ways and methods of 

 his British confreres, particularly in certain 

 nomenclatorial matters, but these he was able 

 to promptly abandon, accepting in their place 

 the then radical innovations that had arisen in 



his home land during his absence. In other 

 words, he soon accepted the A. 0. U. Code of 

 ISTomenclature, with the date of Linne at 1758 

 instead of 1766, its trinomialism, and the point 

 of view regarding species and subspecies thus 

 entailed, which many of his colleagues of the 

 earlier days of his sojourn abroad could never 

 bring themselves to adopt. 



Dr. Elliot was the fourth son of George T. 

 and Eebecca Giraud Elliot. He was descended 

 on his father's side from old Connecticut stock 

 which settled near Wew London early in the 

 sixteenth century, and on his mother's side 

 from French ancestors who settled at Ifew 

 Rochelle and later moved to 'New York some 

 two centuries ago. On the paternal side his 

 forebears were prominent in public affairs, and 

 in the colonial wars against the Indians. He 

 was married in 1858 to Annie Eliza Hender- 

 son, by whom he had two daughters, of whom 

 one, Margaret Henderson Elliot, still survives. 



J. A. Allen 

 American Museum of Natural History, 

 New ToitK 



FRANCIS MARION WEBSTER 



Science has suffered an irreparable loss and 

 the entomological confraternity a severe shock 

 in the death, by pneumonia, of Professor F. 

 M. Webster, in charge of cereal and forage in- 

 sect investigations in the U. S. Bureau of 

 Entomology. The sad event occurred on Jan- 

 uary third at Columbus, Ohio, where he had 

 gone in order to attend the meetings of the 

 American Association for the Advancement 

 of Science. 



Francis Marion "Webster was born at Leba- 

 non, New Hampshire, August 8, 1849, and 

 was therefore in his sixty-seventh year. His 

 first entomological writing occurred in the 

 Chicago Weekly Interocean, July 2, 1874, 

 under the title of " Notes on Some of the 

 Common Injurious Insects." He was ap- 

 pointed assistant state entomologist of Illinois 

 in 1882 and served in that capacity until 1884, 

 publishing several short but interesting and 

 important papers on insects affecting cereal 

 and forage crops. Professor Webster served 



