284 Scientific Intelligence. 



Obituary. 



Angelo Heilprix, naturalist, explorer, and well-known writer 

 and lecturer on geological and geographical subjects, died in 

 New York City July 17th, after a long illness, in the 55th year 

 of his age. A native of Hungary and a descendant of a culti- 

 vated and intellectual family, he was brought to this country 

 Avhile yet a small child by his father and received here his early 

 education. In 1876 he went abroad and, in London, Paris, 

 Geneva and other places, studied subjects chiefly of a geological 

 and biological nature. In London he was awarded the Forbes medal 

 for proficiency in geological work. In 1879 he returned to this 

 country and the following year was appointed professor of inver- 

 tebrate paleontology and geology at the Academy of Natural 

 Sciences in Philadelphia and in 1883 executive curator of its 

 museum, a post he held until 1892. He also filled the chair of 

 geology in the Wagner Free Institute of Science, 1885 to 1890. 

 During the last three years of his life he was lecturer on physical 

 geography in the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University. 



Throughout his life, as opportunity offered, he engaged in 

 active exploration in various parts of the world, making special 

 studies of a geological and geographical character. Thus in 1886 

 he explored Lake Okeechobee, Florida ; in 1888 the Bermuda 

 Islands ; in 1890 parts of South and Central America and Mexico, 

 especially Yucatan, devoting attention particularly to the vol- 

 canoes. In 1891 he became interested in Peary's work and spent 

 two summers in Greenland, leading the i*elief expedition in 1892. 

 In 1896 he travelled in Morocco and Algeria studying the Atlas 

 Mts. He also spent two summers in northern Alaska. His best 

 known work is perhaps that connected with the eruptions of Pelee 

 on Martinique in 1902, where he made a perilous ascent to see 

 the volcano in activity. The results of his observations made 

 during his travels he published in a number of books and maga- 

 zine articles, and he also lectured extensively upon them. He was 

 also a contributor to encyclopedic literature and wrote several 

 popular works on geology. With his brother he edited Lippin- 

 cott's New Gazetteer of the World. 



During his life Heilprin accomplished a large amount of work 

 and while this work was chiefly concerned with the popular 

 rather than with the profounder aspects of science, it was none 

 the less extensive and useful on this account. Men who have his 

 ability to seize and present the essentials of scientific reseai'ch and 

 progress to the public in a clear and lucid manner by word and 

 pen are uncommon, and this added to his energy and enthusiasm 

 for exploration rendered him a man whose death, while still in 

 the prime of life, is a serious loss in his chosen field of work. His 

 wide knowledge, intellectual acquirements and varied talents, as 

 well as his agreeable and friendly disposition, gained for him a 

 large circle of friends, by whom he will be greatly missed, l. v. p. 



Professor James Merrill Safford, of Vanderbilt University, 

 for many years state geologist of Tennessee, died on July 3 at 

 the age of eighty-five years. 



