BuRNHAM : Charles Horton Peck 



37 



Peck would often relate how on Monday mornings, when the 

 boys came in from their Sunday hohday unprepared in their 

 lessons, instead of flogging them, he would take from his desk 

 plants which he cherished and talk to the boys about them. 



On the first of January, 1867, he was appointed by the State 

 to fill the herbarium with specimens representing the plant life of 

 the State. There were at that time about 1,800 specimens in the 

 collections of the State Cabinet of Natural History ; but, at the 

 close of Dr. Peck's career, the herbarium of the State Museum 

 contained many thousands of specimens, including thousands of 

 priceless mycological collections. 



Rev. Moses A. Curtis, of North Carolina, first gave Dr. Peck 

 a start in the fungi, which was the beginning of the mycological 

 collection of the State Herbarium — a collection, the gathering and 

 study of which has given him a world-wide name for all time. 



In 1868, Dr. Peck visited the Adirondacks and climbed Wall- 

 face without a guide. A very sudden, cold rainstorm came up, 

 and on attempting to descend the mountain in the clouds, he for- 

 tunately came upon a camp well supplied with food and blankets 

 and was thus saved from great peril. After this experience, he 

 seldom attempted to climb the higher Adirondacks alone. 



He visited North Elba a score or more times, and climbed Mt. 

 Marcy eleven times, usually taking two days for the trip. This 

 high peak " is in the center of a very rugged mountainous region, 

 where high peaks separated by deep and narrow valleys rise on 

 all sides. From its summit an observer may look in every direc- 

 tion, and obtain views unsurpassed in beauty and grandeur. A 

 visit to this lofty station necessitates a tiresome walk of six or 

 seven miles through the woods over a rough trail and up some 

 steep acclivities. But the attraction of the place, the magnificent 

 views it affords and the richness of its flora bring many visitors, 

 and few return without feeling well rewarded for the labor and 

 expense incurred." The reports of the Adirondack and State 

 Land Survey, by Verplanck Colvin, 1880, 1891, contain prelimi- 

 nary lists of the plants of the summit of Mt. Marcy ; and the 

 N. Y. State Mus. Bull. 25 : 657-673. 1899, a more complete 

 annotated list. 



