AMERICAN 
JOURNAL OF SCIENCE AND ARTS, 
[THIRD SERIES.] 
=, thee 
Art. XLIV.—Joun Torrey: A Biographical Notice. 
THE following article forms a part of the Annual Report by 
the Council to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 
before which it was read at the meeting on the 8th of April, 
t. This accounts for the form in which the biography is 
cast, and for the exclusion of many details and personal partic- 
ulars which otherwise would naturally have found a place in 
it. It is the President of the American Academy rather than 
the companion and friend of many years who writes ; yet the 
narrative must needs take tone and color from the intimate 
association of the writer with the subject of it. A. GRA 
JouN Torrey, M.D., LL.D., died at New York, on the 10th 
of March, 1873, in the 77th year of his age. He haslong been 
the chief of American botanists, and was at his death the oldest, 
with the exception of the venerable ex-president of the Ameri- 
can Academy (Dr. Bigelow), who entered the botanical field 
Several years earlier, but left it to gather the highest honors 
and more lucrative rewards of the medical profession, about 
the time when Dr. Torrey determined to devote his life to 
Scientific pursuits. 
The latter was of an old New England stock, being, it is 
thought, a descendant of William Torrey, who emigrated from 
Am. Jour, Sct.—Tutrp Series, Vor. V, No. 30.—June, 1873. 
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