CirAllLES CirRISXOPIIP^R FROST. 
117 
science, in my life, came through search for health and mental enter¬ 
tainment; science is not my profession,— shoemaking is,” expresses 
pretty clearly the simplicity of his own theory and practice of life. 
lie was not communicative on his favorite studies, except to those 
who understood them as he did. Indeed, it has been said that he prob¬ 
ably had more friends beyond the Atlantic, with whom he was on terms 
of intimacy, than he had in his native town. Notwithstanding his 
regular business habits, it is pleasant to think that whenever his friend 
Sprague, or some other congenial spirit came to see him, he dropped all 
his business and they entered Mr. Frost’s study to spend forenoon and 
afternoon, for days at a time, or until their work was, for the time being, 
completed. Again, as showing the orderliness and respect pervading 
his domestic relations, this fact is stated by one of his family : Not long- 
before his death, and when his health was failing, he called his two sons 
— his only children — into the room where his wife and himself were 
sitting and said to them that it was his wish that all his fortune, on his 
own death, should go to his wife, and then, in the event of her death 
before either of the sons, it should be ecpially divided between the latter. 
Both the parents have passed away, and all has been amicably adjusted 
in accordance with this simple wish, without the usual precautions of 
will and legal formality. 
Ilis portrait shows a face indicating substantial character. It might 
be considered that of a good business man, but it would no doubt be 
taken, by any stranger who was a good judge, as that of a genuine scholar 
and one strongly endowed with faculties both critical and reflective. 
We have been somewhat particular in describing what may seem to 
be the trivial surroundings of this man’s daily intellectual life, because 
his is probably the best representative life of that class to which he 
belongs and which was deflned at the beginning of this article : a life in 
which : 
“ The t’ewarcl is in the doing' 
And the rapture of pursuing-,” 
no inducement of fame seeming ever for a moment to have influenced him. 
The man who not only declined positions of honor in the scientittc world, 
but is known to have repeatedly but politely declined honorary degrees 
or memberships of learned societies as not worth, to him, the customary 
fee requii-ed in case the prolfer is accepted ; who maintained his peculiar 
self-poise and individuality in all things, is a man rare in the world of 
science and worth (;onsidei-ation and study. 
What were the results of this quiet, industrious, critical study for so 
many years V Certainly the published results must be set down as 
comparatively meager, as might be expected from a man of his views. 
Although he published several short papers, chiefly descriptions of new 
species of fungi, and in the Tkansactions of the Orleans County 
Society of Natural Sciences, a “Catalogue of the Flowerless 
Plants” of northern New England, is printed (about 1871), the best resume 
and indeed Ins chief publication, is the list of mosses, liverworts, characea*. 
