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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. VII., No. 171 



deputation favorably, and will recommend co-oper- 

 ation with other powers in his next annual message. 

 Prof. E. N. Horsford of Cambridge then read a 

 paper on the landfall of John Cabot in 1497. The 

 substance of it has already appeared in Mr. Hors- 

 f Orel's letter to Judge Daly, printed in the journal 

 of the American geographical society, and also in 

 the form of a monograph. Dr. A. B. Hart of 

 Harvard came next, with 'A description of some 

 graphic methods of illustrating history,' with ex- 

 amples of some maps and charts actually used by 

 him in his lecture-room. The paper was listened 

 to with great interest. But the only paper of 

 the morning which evoked discussion was one by 

 Prof. M. C. Tyler of Cornell, on the neglect and 

 destruction of historical materials in this country. 

 The reverend doctor was most justifiably severe 

 on the almost criminal way in which American 

 famihes, with a few notable exceptions, have 

 treated the papers left by their ancestors. Judge 

 Mellen Chamberlain of the Boston public library 

 agreed with Dr. Tyler, and, in addition, called 

 attention to the duty that certain families who 

 have inherited public papers from their ancestors 

 owe to the public to return all documents that 

 really form part of the public archives to the pub- 

 lic depositaries, whether state or national ; and a 

 motion to that effect was introduced and carried. 

 It may seem singular that such a motion should 

 be necessary, but one hundred years ago it was by 

 no means uncommon for a governor or secretary 

 of state, on his departure from office, to take away 

 with him such public papers as interested him ; 

 and to-day many documents which form, or rather 

 should form, a part of the archives, are in the 

 hands of persons who know nothing of their value, 

 and take no more care of them than they take of 

 their own family papers. 



In the evening Mr. Charles Deane of Cambridge 

 presented, in behalf of Mr. Alexander Brown of 

 Nelson county, Va., a paper embodying what may 

 be called the modern views of the early history of 

 his state. The Hon. William Wirt Henry of Rich- 

 mond followed with a paper describing the part 

 taken by Virginia in establishing religious liberty 

 under the leadership of his grandfather, Patrick 

 Henry. As might have been expected, Mr. Henry 

 did full justice both to his ancestor and his native 

 state. Dr. Channing of Cambridge followed with 

 an abstract of a paper on the social condition of 

 New England in the middle of the last century. 

 He especially emphasized the fact that in one cor- 

 ner of New England slavery then existed on an 

 extensive scale. Mr. T. Jefferson Coolidge, jun., 

 who has been studying with him the past year at 

 Harvard, then read a carefully prepared paper on 

 the development of municipal government in 



Massachusetts. He showed that the first charter 

 of Boston was a direct outgrowth of the New 

 England town system. Judge Chamberlain, in 

 the course of some remarks on this paper, pointed 

 out how completely the individual masses of 

 Americans had become accustomed to organizing. 



The morning session of the second day was 

 opened by Edward G. Mason, Esq., of Chicago, 

 with a thoroughly enjoyable essay on the march 

 of the Spaniards across Illinois. This was in many 

 respects the most valuable paper presented. It 

 will shortly be printed in the Magazine of Ameri- 

 can history, and needs no further mention here. 

 At this session Mr. William A. Mowry of the 

 Journal of education presented his well-known 

 views upon the disputed question as to whether 

 the Louisiana purchase included Oregon. Mr. 

 Mowry's argument is in many respects a strong 

 one ; but it may pertinently be asked, supposing 

 that he is correct in his assertion that Oregon was 

 not within the limits of that purchase, how did 

 the United States acquire it? Mr. E. B. Scott of 

 Wilkesbarre, Penn., closed the session with an ac- 

 count of the settlement of the lower St. Lawrence. 



In the evening Prof. A. Scott of Rutgers led off 

 with a paper on the origin of the highest func- 

 tion of the American judiciary, in the course of 

 which he remarked that he thought that New 

 Jersey had some share in the revolution, which, 

 judging from the general drift of the papers, 

 seemed to have been the exclusive work of Massa- 

 chusetts and Virginia. Mr. J. M. Merriam, an 

 undergraduate student at Harvard, then read a 

 paper showing that the number of removals usu- 

 ally attributed to Jefferson was much too small. 

 This paper attracted considerable interest, and 

 was printed in full in one of the Washington daily 

 papers. Another of Dr. Channing's pupils, Mr. 

 A. B. Houghton, was put down for a paper on the 

 international aspect of the Panama canal. He 

 was unavoidably absent, and a very short account 

 of his work was presented. The last paper on the 

 list for the evening was an address by Dr. F. W. 

 Taussig of Harvard on the early protection move- 

 ment and the tariff of 1828, in which it was shown 

 that the Jackson and Adams men so angled for 

 the votes of all sections that the tariff of 1828, as 

 passed, pleased no one. Mr. Henry Adams, whose 

 history of the period from 1783 to 1812 is so 

 anxiously awaited by students of American his- 

 tory, closed the session with a few remarks sup- 

 plementary to Mr. Merriam's paper. He thought, 

 however, that credit was still due to Mr. Jefferson 

 for not making even more removals than, accord- 

 ing to the essayist, he did make. 



But the third day was in many respects the 

 most interesting day of all. Gen. G. W. Cullum, 



