Sketch of Charles Baker Adams. — Seely. n 
ing his favorite study when attacked by the fatal malady, 
which in comparatively earl}' life took him from his chosen 
field. Science lost a zealous, helpful promoter, when in the 
earlv blooming of his powers the promise of great fruitage was 
sadly and suddenly cut off. 
To the family the loss was more than can be told. One son 
had died in infancy. The wife, four sons and a daughter sur- 
vived him. In 1839 professor Adams had married Mary 
Holmes, a woman of strong mental endowments and noble 
character, the daughter of the Rev. Sylvester Holmes of New 
Bedford, Mass., and to her care the young household of five 
children was unexpectedly committed. How these children 
were trained to honor their father and their father's name, and 
how they exhibited their loyalty to their country may be 
learned by a recital of their career. Two of the sons, Charles 
Breck and Sylvester Holmes, died in 1861. members of the 
union army in the civil war. Dr. Edward Hitchcock served 
twelve years in the navy during the latter part of the war of the 
rebellion and the period of reconstruction that followed, and 
Henry, the fourth son, was in one of the hundred day regi- 
ments made up of men called away from pressing business. 
And later his grandson Charles Melbourne Atwood, son of his 
only daughter, Mrs. Lillie Adams Atwood, gave his service 
and his life in the recent Spanish- American war. 
A portrait of professor Adams, the gift of his son Henry, 
appropriately honors the library of Amherst college. On the 
shelves and in the cases of both colleges. Middlebury and Am- 
herst, are abiding evidences of his work in the form of suites 
of Vermont rocks collected during the state geological survey. 
These with his mineralogical and zoological specimens stand 
just now at the half century mark, as a memorial of the abil- 
ity and incessant activity of professor Adams. 
He was a member of many societies, chiefly the following : 
Association of American Geologists, Boston Society of Na- 
tural History, Philadelphia Academy of Natural Science, Ly- 
ceum of Natural History of New York, American Academy of 
Arts and Sciences, Natural History Society of Nuremburg 
(Corresponding Member), Honorary Member of Jamaica So- 
ciety. 
