7b Readers and Correspo7idents. 



143 



" To the Editor of the National Gazette. 

 <» Sir — When a matter has been referred for adjustment to impartial arbitrators, the ap- 

 peai'ance of exparte anonymous slatements is evidence at once of weakness aud unfair- 

 ness. 



" Such is the character of the communication signed X., in your paper of Tuesday, the 

 24th. Neither was your Gazette deemed of sufficient importance to attain the secret ob- 

 ject of the writer; a Uieral copy of it having been lodged at the same time with a re- 

 spectable morning paper, into whose columns it thus stu-reptitiously got the next day. 



" It is not the intention of the writer of this note to repeat at this thne the particular his- 

 tory of the transaction whitji has produced this anonymous attack, the nature ol' which 

 is perfectly understood by those whom it concerns. That history is to be found in the 

 United States Gazette of this morning. The writer will content hnnself w^ith stating, that 

 the matter upon which the difference of opinion has arisen was referred on Friday, the 

 20th, to a committee of three members of the American Philosophical Society, supposed 

 to be entirely unprejudiced, by a majoriiy of the members present. If any one of them 

 was not so, he will not be able to conceal the fact that he was covertly placed on that 

 committee for the purpose of perpetuating error. Unimportant as the matter may appear, 

 the interests of natural science and of truth are involved in it; and individuals who 

 clearly show they are not friends to impartial investigation, must suppose their conduct 

 will be vigilantly attended to. 



" It has been usually attributed to those who cherish the love of natural history, that 

 their truest reward is that certain elevation of mind they receive in the cultivation of 

 their pursuit. A true naturalist loves only to be taught by nature, and disdains to teach 

 by other means. It is the empirical pretender alone who is your anonymous oracle. 



" As to the statements of X., they are all wide from the truth. He is afraid of the de- 

 cision of the committee, and, therefore, ' vvitii trumpets and with shawms,' he is ' trium- 

 phantly sustaining and vindicating brilliant discoveries,' the fame of which, it is predicted, 

 will never extend beyond the columns of a newspaper." "F." 



Dr. Hays, however, it appears, was determined to force himself into notice, and to re- 

 move all doubts as to who wrote the article signed X., he procured the following state- 

 ment to be published in the July number of the Journal of the Franklin Institute. 



" Dr. Hays rose, and after some prefatory remarks, slated in substance as follows. 

 That an attack upon the scientific reputation of Dr. Godman, late Professor of Natural 

 History in the Institute, having been made very recently by a lecturer on geology, in a 

 public lecture delivered in the hall of the Institute, at which many members of the so- 

 ciety were present; and that a thorough investigation of the subject having resulted in 

 a complete refutation of the attack, he thought it would be interesting to the members 

 of the Institute to be put in possession of the facts upon which the vindication of their 

 late Professor rested. 



" The lecturer before alluded to, had stated to his class, that the animal described by 

 Dr. Godman as new, under the name of Tetracaulodon Masiodontoideum, was nothing 

 more than the young of the common mastodon. In support of this, the lecturer had ex- 

 hibited two lovk^er jaw bones from the collection of the American Philosophical Society, 

 one of which he stated to be that of a young animal, and showed the socket which had 

 once contained the tooth characteristic of the animal described by Dr. Godman, while 

 the other, which he said was that of an adult, was asserted by him to have contained no 

 such socket. The lecturer had also exhibited a tusk which he said was the milk tusk of 

 the young of the gigantic mastodon. 



" Doctor Hays proceeded to say, that the jaw exhibited by the lecturer as that of a 

 young animal, had proved, on examination, to be that of an adult, as the dentition clearly 

 showed ; while in that admitted by the lecturer to be the jaw of an old animal, the re- 

 mains of the socket which had once contained a tusk, was clearly to be seen. And fur- 

 ther, that the tusk exhibited by the lecturer as a milk tusk, was evidently that of an old 

 animal. 



" Dr. H. stated that he had communicated to the American Philosophical Society, the 

 proofs of the accuracy of the preceding statement. 



" A. D. Bache, Chairman. 



"J. Henry Bulkley, Rec. Sec." 



This statement, which is malignantly intended to injure the editor with the friends of 

 Dr. Godman, and with the public, is a mass of inconsistency and falsehood. 



First. It has been shown that the scientific reputation of Dr. Godman never was at- 

 tacked. 



Second. That there had been no refutation of an attack, but that an unequivocal assent 

 had been extorted from Dr. Hays, by the specimens which the lecturer in geology had 

 used. 



Third. That the lecturer never had asserted one of the jaws to have been that of a 

 young animal with a socket, and the other, that of an old animal without a socket ; but 



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