598 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NEW YORK MEETING 



used gestures, his favorite pose being to rest both hands on a book. And 

 what flashing speaking that was, whether formal or informal ; never hur- 

 ried or undignified, but in turn impressive or humorous or picturesque 

 and always interesting. The charm extended to all kinds of people. I 

 have seen the rough mountaineers of the south listening fascinated to his 

 words of explanation to the students with him. Perhaps some intuition 

 of the kindness of heart Mdiich underlay his words and actions had to do 

 with this, for ]\Ir Shaler was above all a lover of his fellow-men and wliat 

 concerned them; this was well expressed when in 1903 the degree of 

 LL.D. was conferred on him by Harvard as "naturalist and humanist." 



With all this activity in so many different lines, he yet found time to 

 practice a warm hospitality at his home in Cambridge. He was married 

 in 1862 to Miss Sophia Page, a resident of Kentuckjr, who With two 

 daughters, Mrs Willoughby L. Webb and Mrs Walter L. Page, survives 

 him. The host and hostess welcomed to their home not only those who 

 might fairly be expected to offer some mutual entertainment, but also 

 with true kindness the young and often bashful newcomers in the college. 



Professor Shaler's jiublications dealing with geology and kindred topics 

 number nearly two hundred titles besides many popular articles in the 

 magazines. They deal with paleontology (especially in the earlier years), 

 glaciation, mountain-building, shorelines, earthquakes, the elevation of 

 continents, swamps and peat-deposits, soils, phosphate beds, petroleum, 

 coal, building stones, changes of climate, caverns, and manj^ others. He 

 published various separate works, such as text-books and popular works 

 dealing with various features of geology, always emphasizing the relation 

 to man. His "First Book of Geology" was translated into Polish. His 

 last important scientific publication, "A comparison of the features of the 

 earth and the moon,'' published in 1903 by the Smithsonian Institution, 

 with superb plates, is an interesting attempt to explain lunar features by 

 the experience of geology. It illustrates an unexpected persistency in 

 following certain lines of research, for his work with the telescope had 

 been done thirty years earlier. I am told that for several years before his 

 death he had been studying the coast charts of the world in continuation 

 of his earlier work on shorelines and had even visited Egypt with this in 

 mind. 



Among his miscellaneous writings mention should be made of a series 

 of philosophical essays entitled "The citizen, a study of the individual 

 and the government ;" "The indi^ddual, a study of life and death ;" "The 

 neighbor, the natural history of human contacts," and others, which deal 

 with these subjects in an original way from the point of view of the 

 naturalist. 



