274 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 347. 



from Columbia in 1800, and in 1810 moved 

 to Liberty county, Georgia, where he had 

 inherited a large plantation. Here he mar- 

 Tied Ann Quarterman, a lady of English 

 Puritan descent. Of these parents Joseph 

 Le Conte was born, one of a family of four 

 sons and three daughters. 



Louis Le Conte divided his time between 

 the management of his estate and the pur- 

 suit of scientific studies, particularly chem- 

 istry and botany. He maintained a botan- 

 ical garden which was famous in its day as 

 one of the best in the country, Joseph 

 Le Conte received his elementary education 

 at a local school, but his father's tastes and 

 scientific work exercised a powerful influ- 

 ence upon his youthful mind as it did also 

 upon that of his brother John, and both 

 were early drawn to the pursuit of science 

 as their life work. 



In those days almost the only profession 

 that afforded an opening to scientific pursuit 

 was that of medicine, so that, after gradu- 

 ating from the University of Georgia, both 

 brothers entered upon the medical course at 

 the College of Physicians and Surgeons, in 

 New York, Joseph receiving the degree of 

 M.D. in 1845. 



It was in the summer vacation of 1844, 

 when a young man of 21, that Joseph Le 

 Conte made his first noteworthy geological 

 excursion. In this year he joined the fi7'st 

 prospecting and exploring expedition to the 

 now famous mining district of the south 

 shore of Lake Superior. The writer has 

 several times listened with delight to Pro- 

 fessor Le Conte's account of this boating 

 cruise from the lower lakes to Keewenaw 

 Point, of his camping adventures, and how, 

 after a sojourn of a few weeks with the 

 prospectors on Keewenaw Point, he and his 

 cousin with some Indians proceeded on a 

 long canoe voyage along the south shore to 

 the present site of Duluth, and thence to the 

 upper waters of the Mississippi and down 

 do the Falls of St. Anthony, long before a 



cabin existed on the site of the cities of 

 Minneapolis and St. Paul. 



After receiving his medical degree he 

 practiced medicine at Macon, Georgia, from 

 1845 to 1850. In 1847 he married Caroline 

 Eli25abeth, the daughter of Alfred M. Nis- 

 bet, at Midway, near Milledgeville, Ga. 

 His wife, one son and three daughters sur- 

 vive him. In 1850, feeling doubtless that 

 the practice of medicine failed to afford 

 those opportunities for the study of natural 

 science to which he was so strongly in- 

 clined, and being drawn by the fame of 

 Agassiz, he abandoned medicine and went 

 to Cambridge. Here under the influence 

 of the great interpreter of nature, his own 

 career as a devoted student of science was 

 finally determined. It is doubtful whether 

 any other disciple of this great teacher has 

 done more to advance the cause of nature 

 study among the people of this country. 

 In the early part of 1857 he was associated 

 with Agassiz in a study of the keys and 

 reefs of Florida, and it would be difficult to 

 cite a more captivating study for two such 

 kindred spirits, or a study where geolog- 

 ical and biological interests are more inti- 

 mately knit together. Late in the same 

 year, having received the degree of B.S. at 

 Harvard, he returned to Georgia and was 

 elected to the chair of natural science in 

 Ogelthrope University. This post he re- 

 signed the following year to accept the 

 chair of geology and natural history in the 

 University of Georgia, in which institution 

 his brother John was the professor of nat- 

 ural philosophy. Here he taught for four 

 years. In 1856 the brothers both resigned 

 their chairs and accepted calls to South 

 Carolina College, at Columbia, Joseph to be 

 professor of geology and natural history 

 and John to be professor of physics. They 

 held these positions till 1862, when the col- 

 lege succumbed to the trouble arising out 

 of the Civil War. These were busy years 

 at Columbia ; in the enjoyment of the con- 



