A UNIQUE CHARACTER 



MONTBELIER, Vt., Feb. 27. . 



JOSEPH BATTPJLL, wlio died in Mlddlebury last weeflc, was one of 

 the many unique cliaiacters Vermont has produced and was a 

 large contributor to the progress and advancement of his native 

 state. He was the largest individual land ownea- in Vermont. 

 Ever since he was a young man Mr. Battell had been, buying uncul- 

 tivated land whenever opportunity arose. He held mueh for himself, 

 but he has siven to the state two moilntains, making only the reser- 

 vation that the lands should be held for the use of the state. Mount 

 Ellen In Addison county and Camel's Hump, more profperly called the 

 Crouching Lion, are his two great contributions in this respect. 



JlT. Sattell reudCi'cd another distinct servive, not especially to 

 Vermont, but to all New England, in his work for the restoration of 

 the Morgan horse. Tijat, f train of horse flesh appears to have been 

 a sort of freak, but the progenitor, Justin Morgan, had that faculty 

 of prepotency that stamij^'d the irapuess of his great capacity oii^ the 

 offspviu.u-. Bui as tlif -hcapeL- vrestcrn horses invaded the New. Eng- 

 land icrritory the brcci'ing of Morgans declined. Mr. Baftell sought 

 to rrisiore Llio old stra.in and his publication of the Morgan Register, 

 a monunicnlal work for which he never 'received any adequate com- 

 pensation did much t i revive interest in the Morgpan horse, riis gift 

 of a ."jOO-acie i'arm in Weybridge to the governmeint, to be used as a 

 Morgan breeding station also aided in the movement. Today the 

 Morgan is one of the horses most sought for. They are not racers, 

 just ordiuai'y road t*,nd handsome carriage hoirses, but the mart 

 who raises a pair of correctly bred" Morgan horses and has them prop- 

 erh' trained can demand as large a pri<*e for them as the owners of 

 any of the more spectacular breeds. 



Mr. Battell was also a 'philosopher. His work, "Ellen, or the 

 Whisperin.r: Pine," was an attempt to found a iftew school of physics. 

 The undulatory theory was broadly discussed, and while physicists 

 have not .by any moans accepted the new theoi'ies he advanced, he 

 has compelled consideration of his Ideas. 



He was, in fact, a unique but not unexpected product of New 

 England— a farmer, a hotel keeper, a publishesr, a writer, a philoso- 

 pher, a statesman, a philanthropist — a great man, but one whose per- 

 sonal idiosyncrasiel would not permit him to appear in the class of 

 grea! iiier, as the world knows them. He nvade large contributions 

 to 'iiK tir.ie aivl ''is |ieo|/lc. He worked freely, he gave liberally, he 

 had in iiiin-l always the public and not himself, and he deserves a 

 larger ii-ilniie than the siniple recnunting of his quiet deeds would 



