224 MEMOEIAL OF GEORGE GIBBS. 



first sign of danger. And in the New York riots he sought the phice 

 of greatest peri!, and vohmteered for the defense of the house of Gen- 

 eral E'reinont , when a night attack was threatened. Ho was not a man 

 to ask another to do that which he was not ready to do himself. 



Later lie resided in Washington, and was mainly employed in the 

 Hudson Bay Claims Commission, to which he was secretary. He was 

 also engaged in the arrangement of a large mass of manuscript bearing 

 upon the ethnology and philology of the American Indians. His serv- 

 ices were nvailed of by the Smithsonian Institution to superintend its 

 labors in this (Jelcl, and to his energy and complete knowledge of the 

 subject it greatly owes its success in this branch of service. 



He published, some years since, a series of the vocabularies of the 

 Clammal, Lummi, and Chinook languages, and of the Chinook jar- 

 gon, besides other tracts of a similar kind; and at the time of his 

 death was engaged in superintending the printing for the Smithsonian 

 Institution of a quarto volume of American Indian vocabularies, and 

 had fortunately arranged and carefully criticised many hundred f?eries 

 before his death. This publication Vvill continue under the direction of 

 Piof. W. D. Whitney, J. H. Trumbull, LL. D., and Prof. Roehrig. 

 His large collection of papers on the intlian languages, of translations 

 ol many and curious legends, all of incalculable value to science, has 

 been bequeathed to the Smithsonian Institution, his numerous maps 

 and charts to the Geographical Society, and such of his books as were 

 suitable for the purpose to this society. 



In 1871 Mr. Gibbs married his cousin, Miss Mary Kane Gibbs, of 

 Newport, E. I., and removed to New Haven, where he died on the 9th 

 of April, 1873. Though a great sufferer at times from a chronic disease 

 of the most painful character, his last years were happy beyond the 

 common lot. His house was celebrated for its simple, unaffected hospi- 

 tality, and was the resort of a cbartning circle of refined and cultivated 

 people. 



To whatever work Mr. Gibbs was engaged he devoted his whole heart 

 and every energy he possessed. This historical society owes its present 

 prosperity as much to his aids as to those of any person. Its revival, 

 in 1810, was largely owing to his determined efforts; its librarian for 

 six years, from 1812 to 1818, and long a leading member of the execu- 

 tive committee and library committees, he never wearied in his efforts 

 to promote its prosperity. Its frequenters have not forgotten his hale 

 and hearty presence, his genial manner,, his cheerfaltemper. Honest to 

 the requirement of the ancient philosopher, generous to a fault, though 

 in his varied life he had received but small aid from fortune, he was 

 one of the warmest-hearted, most charitable of men. Who will soon 

 forget his plain, outspoken, manly, and unvarnished speech, his indig- 

 nant denunciation of wrong, his hatred of oppression? The edge of 

 his speech did not always carry the polish of the scimitar, but its blow 

 fell heavy as that of the battle -ax. 



