120 
THE SCIENTIST. 
ant Siiro-eon U. S. A.; and on coming of 
age passed a successful examination for 
the Medical Corps of the Army. He re- 
ceived his commission in 1804, and was 
immediately ordered to duty in Arizona. 
His early years of service in that terrl- 
tor}^, and afterward in North and South 
Carolina, was utilized in investigating; 
the natural histoi-y of those regions, 
respecting which he published various 
scientific papers. Though he wrote some 
professional articles during his hospital 
experience, Dr. Cones seems never to 
have been much interested in the prac- 
tice of medicine and surger}^ and has 
consequently made no enduring maik in 
his ostensible profession. After about 
ten 3^ears of ordinary militar}' service as 
Post Surgeon in various places, he was 
in 1873, while on duty at Fort Randall, 
Dakota, appointed Surgeon and Natural- 
ist (>f the U. S. Northern Boundery Com- 
mission, which surveyed the line along 
the fort3'-ninth Parallel from the Lake 
of the Woods to the Rocky Mountains. 
This service took him into the field in 
1873 and 1874, and fortunately brought 
him to Washington to prepare the scien- 
tific report of Ills operations. His many 
publications, notably his "Key to North 
American Birds'' and '"Field Ornitholo- 
gy'' which had lately appeared, had al- 
ready established his reputation as a 
naturalist; and on the completion of the 
Boundery Survey in 1876, his services 
were secured as Secretary and Naturalist 
of the United States Geological and Geo- 
graphical Survey of the Territories, un- 
der the late Dr. F. V. Hay den. He edited 
all the publications of the Survey from 
1876 to 188(1, meanwhile conducting Zoo- 
logical explorations in the Avest; and 
during this period contributed several 
volumes, from his own pen, to the Re- 
ports of the Survey, notable his "Birds 
of the Northwest" in 1874, "Fur-bear- 
ing Animals " in 1877, "Monographs of 
the Rodentia" (with Prof. J. A. Allen) 
in 1877, "Birds of the Colorado Valley" 
in 1878, and several instalments of a uni- 
versal "• Bibliography of Oi'iiithology." 
The lattei- work attracted special atten- 
tion in Europe, and Dr. Cones was 
signally ccnnpliniented by an invitation, 
signed by Darwin, Huxley, Flower, New- 
ton. Sclater and about forty other lead- 
ing British Scientists, to take up his res- 
idence in London and identify himself 
with the British Museum. Dr. Cones 
also projected and had well under wa}' a 
"History of North American Mammals" 
which was ordered to be printed b}' Act 
of Congress; when suddenly, at the very 
height of his scientific researches and 
literary labors he was ordei'cd by the 
W^ar Department to routine medical duty 
on the frontiei-. He obeyed the oi-der 
and proceeded to Arizona, but found it 
of course impossible to resume a life he 
had long since outgrown. His indignant 
protests being of no avail, he returned to 
Washington and promptly tendei-ed his 
resignation from theArni3%in order to 
continue his scientific career unhampered 
by red-tape. The action of the militaiy 
authorities in this instance seems incom- 
prehensible, and the true histoiy of this 
episode in.Dr. Coues's life remains to be 
written. It is believed to have resulted 
from personal hostility, based upon pro- 
fessional jealous}^ 
Dr. Cones had during the proceeding 
two decades become a member of most 
of the scientific societies of the United 
States, and of several of Europe. He re- 
ceived the highest technical honor to be 
attained by an American Scientist in his 
election to the Academy of Natural 
Science in 1877, and was for some years 
the youngest Academician. Llis candi- 
dature was based by his friends less upon 
the zoological works by which he was 
then best known, than upon his published 
investigations in Comparative Anatomy 
and Physiology, which has brought him 
to the front rank an-iong biologists. The 
same year savr his election to the Chair 
of Anatomy of the National Medical 
