THE CORRESPONDENCE OF SCHWEINITZ AND TORREY 247 
ally to our friend Halsey. I know not why you have ceased your 
correspondence with me,—for I always valued it, & found it very 
profitable. My last letter to you was written about a year ago.— 
I then proposed that we should make an excursion to Quaker 
Bridge together, & knowing (or rather understanding from some 
of our friends—I forget who) that you was to be in Philadelphia 
about the middle of May I proceeded there, in the expectation of 
seeing you—but you had left the City.—Perhaps you never re- 
ceived the letter to which I allude——And now my dear Sir, what- 
ever may have been the cause of the long interruption in our cor- 
respondence, I hope it may be renewed, for I have’ turned again to 
my botanical studies with great zeal. Since I came to New York 
my time has been very much taken up with the duties of my station 
as Prof". of Chemistry in the Medical College—but my business 
is now arranged so as to allow me leisure to prosecute Natural 
History with advantage. If you will allow me to say a few words 
more about myself I will inform you that I have been writing for 
the 2nd vol. of the Flora of the Northern States [89], so long laid 
aside. I have also been arranging my Herbarium, & making 
myself acquainted with some branches of botany which I had too 
much neglected—particularly the Natural Classification, now 
apparently about to supplant & throw out of use, the Sexual 
System of Linnaeus. We have no other botanists besides Halsey 
& myself—for Le Conte can hardly be called a New Yorker— 
& Cooper has relinquished the study of plants.—Of course I have 
but little botanical news to send you— 
You have heard that Dr. Eights, whom the Lyceum sent out in 
a vessel bound for the S. Seas, returned last fall without having 
accomplished much, for it turned out just as several of us sus- 
pected, that the Expedition was destined, not for discovery, & for 
scientific purposes—but to catch seals! 
Dr. Gates, sent out by an Association (of which I believe you a 
member) to the countries west of the Mississippi, has done as yet 
but little better, for he lost nearly a whole year by sickness. 
Early last spring, while recruiting at New Orleans, & while still 
very feeble, he received the offer of a professorship in some literary 
Inst". in Mobile, which he accepted. He has lately written to 
Cooper, informing him that he collected last year about 9000 
