Annual Address. 



7 



gence and dignity of science. Here he made those curions 

 observations, recorded in our Transactions, of the peculiar 

 effects produced upon certain crops by the sun's rays fall- 

 ing upon them through the foliage of certain kinds of 

 trees; and here it was, that in connection with Fulton, 

 those plans were perfected that enabled them to launch 

 upon the Hudson the first steam boat that ever navigated 

 its waters. Without attempting to apportion among the 

 various claimants to this great invention their respective 

 shares of merit, I think it may be fairly said in regard to 

 Livingston, that he was among the earliest to believe in 

 its practicability, that through long years of vast expendi- 

 tures, baffled hopes and abortive experiments^ he gave to 

 it his influence, his money and his best efforts, and that 

 through these it was first brought to a successful result. 

 It was a fitting consummation of a career which, from the 

 beginning, had been one of eminent usefulness and honor. 

 There are moments in life which bring with them the fulfil- 

 ment and reward of years of toil and sacrifice. Such, we 

 may well believe, was to him the time, when looking down 

 from the portico of his own stately mansion on the heights 

 of Clermont, he first caught sight of his own little steamer 

 rounding the hills of Dutchess and cleaving its way, like 

 some strong swimmer, against wind and tide up the waters 

 of the Hudson. I have thought it fitting to call your 

 attention somewhat at length to the obligations which the 

 state and the country owe to this great man, because he 

 was the chief founder of this society — for more than twenty 

 years its president, and always its most faithful supporter 

 and contributor. More than half a century has gone by 

 since his death, and we have had other great men in the 

 state and at our own head to carry forward the work to 

 which his life was devoted, but none of them have been 

 distinguished by higher intellectual qualities, by a loftier 



