xxxviii PROCEEDINGS OF THE CENTENARY MEETING. 



wont to tease me afterwards because I used to express fear (hat Dr. Livingstone 

 would discover everything in Africa before I could have a chance. The day after 



visiting Lippincott's bookstore I visited the Academy of Natural Science 



lodged in that tall narrow building, which has been referred to this evening as 



having stood where later stood the Hotel Lafayette. There I feasted my eyes 

 upon Dr. Kane's polar bear. For years the memory of that wonderful sight has 



lived with me, and whenever thinking of the arctic regions, Dr. Kane's polar 

 bear, by the laws of natural association, has come back in memory, glorified, as 

 are all the visions of childhood. Yesterday, after more than half a century, 

 I saw Dr. Kane's polar bear again. Horrible! How the now time-worn relic 

 has shattered the memories of childhood! Taxidermy has made great advances 

 during the past half of a century. We can do better in the way of stuffing polar 

 bears to-day. We had three polar bears sent in cold storage to us from within 

 the Arctic Circle only a short time ago, and prepared them in Pittsburgh. Had 

 anybody told me more than fifty years ago, as I stood looking at Dr. Kane's 

 bear, that I should myself have three bears of the same species shipped to me 

 from Siberia to Pittsburgh, and that I should have them skinned there and 

 mounted for a museum, I should have declared the idea supremely ridiculous. 

 But the thing has actually happened. 



To be a member of The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia seemed 

 to me in my youth the highest honor which could come to mortal man; and later, 

 when good old Doctor Ruschenberger, Mr. John Jordan, the President of the 

 Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and Dr. Nolan proposed me for membership, 

 1 was one of the happiest young men in America. 



The memories which cluster around this institution are precious to me. 

 I will not speak of those who are living. I knew Durand and 1 iot, and many 

 other botanists, whom my youth were connecting links with tin early days of 

 this institution. When Mr. Stone entertained us tin, afternoon with his most 

 ntT.f ng a 11 T 1 ° f ^ pine - barrens <* New Jersey, there came back to me a 

 D^rld T f ° f , Ce [ tain g0ldGn da ^ s which I Passed in company with 



R^S™ ^ T fathGr (wh ° WaS a botanist )> ^1 ">y mother's cousin, 



^J2?' I" iT + Si ° n ° f an GXCUrsion t0 N <- ■>«■* to study and 



5 IWSS S V^ h ° n0red pr ° feSSOr of astronomy in the University 



^r^TS'p I • ? h f ^n 11 dayS ' When a11 the world was young, and my 



SteTSd^hpTJ ^ ^ When the fl0Wers we gathered were the 

 again ^^ We heard were the sweetest will never come 



great ^^^^7^^ ° f yearS t0 P reside <** the destinies of the 



14^^^^, t g rr ity of one of the most - ted — (by 



generous rifte aSSnS t headwa ters of the Ohio. Supported by the 



to do 'm^J^^^^ U ^ i Andr ™ Carnegie we have undertaken 



western part of this great Commonwealth work allied to that which 



