2 Elliot, In Memoriam: Elliott Coues. rAuk 



L Jan. 



in a peculiar and intimate relationship such a time has surely 

 come, for as we are gathered here to-day, one engaging presence, 

 one vitalizing force, one attractive personality, one brilliant mind 

 is no longer in our midst, to grace, strengthen and assist us in our 

 deliberations, and in the accomplishment of duties that must be 

 met. Who shall measure the extent of the loss sustained by 

 various branches of scientific and historical research, by this and 

 kindred societies, by those of us who have parted from an 

 intimate friend and colleague of many vanished years, as well as 

 the younger men just entering upon the scientific field, in the 

 recent death of our former President and late colleague, Elliott 

 Coues. No one occupied a more prominent position in our midst 

 than he and no one held it by a stronger claim founded on excep- 

 tional ability, in brilliant work successfully accomplished. 



On September 9th, 1842, in the town of Portsmouth, New 

 Hampshire, Elliott Coues was born, and as soon as he could 

 exhibit a preference for any object, his taste for ornithology was 

 manifested, and even when only able to toddle about the nursery, 

 a poster of one of the old style menageries rendered him oblivious 

 to all other attractions and no book nor story interested him 

 unless animals were their subjects. So early did the tastes and 

 preferences that were to be the chief controlling influences cf his 

 life declare themselves. When he was eleven years of age his 

 father, Samuel Elliott Coues, removed to Washington, in which 

 city our late colleague was destined to pass a large part of his 

 life, and where some of his most important works were to be 

 written. For a time he attended Gonzaga College, a Jesuit Insti- 

 tution, and where, to one of his ardent temperament, the gorgeous 

 ritual of the Romish church would be apt to make a deep impres- 

 sion, but his was to be an energetic life that demanded a wide 

 field for its activity, and could not be pent amid cloistered shades 

 or cathedral aisles. In his early days he was rather inclined to 

 neglect the classics, replying once to a remonstrance of his father, 

 " I only want just enough of these things to facilitate my other 

 work," but later he appreciated the importance of a thorough 

 knowledge of the ancient tongues and they had no more earnest 

 advocate than himself. At the age of seventeen he entered 

 Columbia College, now Columbian University, took his degree of 



