LeConte, Joseph, 
 
 1823-1901. 
 The autobiography of 
 
 Joseph Le Conte; 
 
THE LIBRARY OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
 NORTH CAROLINA 
 
 AT CHAPEL HILL 
 
 ENDOWED BY THE 
 
 DIALECTIC AND PHILANTHROPIC 
 
 SOCIETIES 
 
UNIVERSITY OF N.C. AT CHAPEL HILL 
 
 10001250959 
 
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 the last date stamped under "Date Due." If not on hold it 
 may be renewed by bringing it to the library. 
 
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THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 
 JOSEPH LE CONTE 
 
/J 
 
 Copyright, 1898, by George L. Wil 
 
 Professor JOSEPH LE CONTE. 
 
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 
 
 JOSEPH LE CONTE 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 WILLIAM DALLAM ARMES 
 
 * — r y— U-< i-'\ 
 
 
 
 NEW YORK 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 
 1903 
 
Copyright, 190S 
 By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 
PREFACE 
 
 In justice to Professor Le Conte and to the 
 reader a few words are necessary as to the 
 origin of the following b'ook and the respective 
 parts of the author and the editor in its prepa- 
 ration. 
 
 During the illness of his daughter in Cali- 
 fornia in 1900 Professor Le Conte had many 
 long talks with her about his early experiences 
 and was by her urged to write out an account 
 of them for his family. He was then too busy 
 preparing for a trip abroad to undertake the 
 work; but later in the year, in his old home in 
 Columbia, S. C, whither he had gone from New 
 York to recuperate from a severe illness that 
 interfered with his plan of visiting Europe, his 
 thoughts reverted to her request, and in this 
 period of enforced leisure he began to write his 
 reminiscences. In the midst of the scenes in 
 
 v 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 which the events that he was narrating occurred, 
 and surrounded by his children, grandchildren, 
 and great-grandchildren, for whom the manu- 
 script was intended and to whom from time to 
 time portions of it were read, he wrote con 
 amore, and what was originally intended as a 
 sketch became a detailed autobiography. On 
 his return to California early in 1901 he con- 
 tinued the work, but with flagging interest, the 
 latter years of his life being treated in a com- 
 paratively summary manner. Fortunately, 
 however, the account was brought down to a 
 few months before his death, and concluded with 
 a statement of what he himself considered of 
 most value in his life-work. 
 
 After his death a number of his colleagues 
 were asked to prepare biographical memoirs for 
 publication by the various scientific associations 
 of which he was a member, and were permitted 
 to use the " autobiographic sketch." Their ex- 
 tracts from it attracted attention, and the 
 family was urged to have the whole edited and 
 published. Somewhat reluctantly they acceded 
 to the request of his friends, and to me was 
 given the honor of preparing for the press the 
 last work of my old teacher. 
 
 The question of the future publication of 
 vi 
 
PEEFACE 
 
 the work had been suggested to Professor Le 
 Conte by his daughter, and he had answered 
 that it certainly could not be published in the 
 shape in which he left it, but that it would 
 be a rich store of material for any possible 
 future biographer. No implied trust was vio- 
 lated, therefore, either in having the manuscript 
 published or in having it edited. 
 
 My desire has been to treat the manuscript 
 with all due reverence, but many changes have 
 been necessary. Many omissions had to be 
 made, as, owing to its origin and the purpose for 
 which it was originally written, it contained 
 much that was too intimately personal and much 
 of too little general interest for publication. On 
 the other hand, many lacunce had to be filled, 
 for in a number of instances Professor Le Conte 
 merely referred to what he had written else- 
 where. His personal experiences during the 
 last days of the Confederacy, for instance, are 
 told in briefest outline in a single paragraph in 
 the manuscript and reference made to a detailed 
 account written immediately after the events. 
 An abstract of this journal, itself a manuscript 
 as long as the autobiographic sketch, has there- 
 fore been substituted for the paragraph and 
 forms Chapters VII and VIII of the book. In 
 B vii 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 other similar instances use has been made of 
 Professor Le Conte's letters and published wri- 
 tings. A certain amount of rearrangement of 
 the material in the manuscript, moreover, was 
 necessitated by the division of the long, con- 
 tinuous narrative into chapters of approxi- 
 mately equal length. The titles of Professor Le 
 Conte's publications, which he, writing currente 
 calamo and with no time for verification, fre- 
 quently cited in the manuscript in general terms 
 or somewhat inaccurately, are in the book taken 
 directly from the articles, to which references 
 are given in foot-notes for the convenience of 
 those desiring to read them. 
 
 With all these changes it has been the 
 editor's desire to preserve the tone and spirit 
 of the original. That the style is frequently 
 colloquial seems to him no defect, for he wished 
 so far as possible to retain all that would tend 
 to reveal the man to those who knew only 
 the author. To them he was the patient in- 
 vestigator, the wise scientist, the fearless, in- 
 dependent, truth-loving thinker; to those who 
 knew him personally, and particularly to those 
 who had the inestimable privilege of being 
 numbered among his " boys and girls," he was 
 all this, but, first and foremost, he was the 
 
 viii 
 
PREFACE 
 
 gentle, kindly spirit, the welcome companion 
 and helpful friend, our beloved " Professor 
 Joe." 
 
 The manuscript was finished such a short 
 time before Professor Le Conte's death that 
 there is but little to add as to the events of his 
 life. His own account ends, " I still hope to 
 finish my year of absence in Europe, but I know 
 not. My son is to marry in June and much de- 
 sires that I should be present at his wedding." 
 He yielded to the desire, gave up all thought of 
 another European trip, and remained quietly in 
 Berkeley until the marriage-day, June tenth. 
 The departure of the young couple on a wed- 
 ding-trip to the King's River canon and the 
 High Sierra thereabouts awakened in him a 
 longing for the mountains and a desire to show 
 the wonders of the Yosemite to his daughter, 
 Mrs. Davis, who had come from South Carolina 
 to be present at her brother's wedding. The 
 Sierra Club, of which he had been an active and 
 enthusiastic member since its organization, was 
 planning a large excursion to the valley and he 
 determined to join it, though warned by his 
 devoted wife that his strength and power of 
 endurance were by no means what they formerly 
 were. 
 
 ix 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 By an odd coincidence he met at the railway 
 station in Oakland one of his companions on his 
 first visit to the Yosemite, Professor Frank 
 Soule, and together they sped in luxurious cars 
 and comfortable stages over the long, hot miles 
 they had weariedly ridden thirty-one years be- 
 fore. In the January, 1902, number of the Sierra 
 Club Bulletin Professor Soule published an arti- 
 cle on Joseph Le Conte in the Sierra, in which he 
 gives the facts as to the last days of his old 
 friend. He writes : " He was happy at the 
 thought of revisiting (for the eleventh time) the 
 great Yosemite, and of showing to his dear 
 ones the unrivaled scenery of that mountain 
 fastness. 
 
 " Standing upon the veranda of the hotel at 
 Wawona, he said to me : ' I have retraced in 
 memory every day's march of our excursion in 
 1870. Can you point out our camping-ground 
 here at Wawona f ' 
 
 " I looked around me and confessed that I 
 could not ; the place was so greatly changed and 
 built upon. 
 
 " "With a pleasant smile and a merry chuckle 
 of triumphant recollection, he pointed along the 
 front line of the veranda to the open field near 
 the stream, and said : ' Do you see those three 
 
 x 
 
PEEFACE 
 
 trees standing together! Well, there were four 
 of them thirty-one years ago, and you and I 
 spread our blankets beneath their branches.' 
 
 " ' Yes, I recall it all now,' I replied. And I 
 marveled at his wonderful memory." 
 
 He arrived at the camp at the base of Glacier 
 Point on the third of July considerably fatigued 
 but in his usual high spirits. For the next two 
 days he was the life of the party, driving with 
 his daughter all over the valley, walking to 
 near-by points of interest, and explaining the 
 geological phenomena to crowds of eager lis- 
 teners. On the evening of the fifth, while very 
 tired from a tramp, he ate a hearty dinner, 
 and soon afterward complained of a severe pain 
 in the region of the heart. A physician was at 
 once summoned and diagnosed the trouble as 
 angina pectoris, and with this diagnosis Pro- 
 fessor Le Conte, himself a physician, agreed. 
 Everything possible was done to relieve the suf- 
 ferer, and in the morning he seemed much better. 
 But about ten o'clock, while the physician was 
 absent procuring additional remedies, he turned 
 upon his left side, and at once his daughter saw 
 a great change come over his countenance. " Do 
 not lie upon your left side, father," she cried. 
 " You know it is not good for you." With a 
 
 xi 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 smile he answered, " It does not matter, daugh- 
 ter." They were his last words. Five minutes 
 later the happy-starred, light-searching spirit 
 had found its way to the source of all happiness 
 and light. 
 
 That evening a coach slowly made its way 
 across the floor of the valley. On one seat was 
 the stricken daughter with a faithful friend, on 
 the other a casket buried from sight beneath 
 laurel wreaths, pine boughs, and the wild flow- 
 ers of the Yosemite. Following it scores of 
 California students and graduates walked with 
 uncovered heads. Halting at the foot of the 
 grade, they watched with straining eyes the 
 coach with its mournful burden toil up the long, 
 lonely mountain road till it disappeared in the 
 darkness, then slowly returned to camp, each 
 with a feeling of personal loss. Five days later 
 the words of the funeral service were spoken in 
 the presence of a vast throng that testified to 
 the grief of all classes of citizens, and all that 
 was mortal of Joseph Le Conte was laid away 
 beside that beloved brother from whom he had 
 so seldom been separated and for whom he had 
 never ceased to mourn. There he rests in the 
 beautiful Mountain View cemetery, his grave 
 marked by a huge boulder from near the spot 
 
 xii 
 
PREFACE 
 
 where lie died in the Yosemite that he had loved 
 so long and so well. 
 
 " When the Greeks made their fine saying 
 that those whom the gods love die young, I can 
 not help believing they had this sort of death 
 also in their eye. For surely, at whatever age 
 it overtake the man, this is to die young." 
 
 W. D. A. 
 
 University of California, 
 Berkeley, February, 1903. 
 
 Xlll 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. — Ancestry, parentage, and boyhood .... 1 
 
 II.— College life ; choice of a profession ; first love, 37 
 III. — Medical study in New York; trip through the 
 
 Northwest . 62 
 
 IV. — Trips to the Georgia mountains ; marriage ; med- 
 ical practise 104 
 
 V. — Study with Agassiz 127 
 
 VI. — Professorships in Oglethorpe University, the 
 University of Georgia, and South Carolina 
 
 College 154 
 
 VII. — In time of war 178 
 
 VIII. — A fugitive before Sherman's army . . . 204 
 
 IX.— After the war 229 
 
 X. — Early years in California 242 
 
 XI. — Scientific and philosophical papers, and summer 
 
 excursions; to 1887 266 
 
 XII. — Geological excursions ; first visit to Europe ; 
 
 1887-1892 291 
 
 XIII. — Scientific activity ; second visit to Europe ; sum- 
 mary 817 
 
 XV 
 
LIST OF ILLITSTKATIONS 
 
 FACING 
 PAGE 
 
 Professor Joseph Le Conte. . . . Frontispiece 
 From a recent photograph 
 
 The Parents of Joseph Le Conte . . . . .16 
 
 Hurricane Fall, Tallulah Falls, Georgia .... 116 
 
 Design for the Le Conte Memorial Lodge . . . 246 
 
 Le Conte Dome (formerly South Dome), Yosemite Valley . 268 
 
 Professor John Le Conte 296 
 
 Mrs. Joseph Le Conte . 302 
 
 Professor Le Conte in Camp in the King's River Cailon . 328 
 
 XV11 
 
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 
 JOSEPH LE CONTE 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, AND BOYHOOD 
 
 The Le Conte family is of Huguenot origin, 
 and is descended from Guillaume Le Conte, who 
 was born in Rouen, March 6, 1659. On the 
 revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1685, he 
 left Rouen. It is probable that he went first to 
 Holland, then accompanied William of Orange 
 to England as an officer in his army, and later, 
 in the nineties, came to America, settling in New 
 Rochelle. Shortly afterward he took a trip to 
 Martinique and there met and married Mar- 
 gueritte de Valleau, daughter of Pierre Joyeulx 
 de Valleau, also a refugee. After his return he 
 resided in New York, where he died in Feb- 
 ruary, 1710. 
 
 The name Le Conte was continued through 
 Pierre, the second son, through whose wife, 
 Valeria Eatton, the Le Conte family is connect- 
 
 2 1 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ed, though now but distantly, with many dis- 
 tinguished families in the United States, among 
 them the Biddle, Baird, and Berrien. Of the 
 children of Pierre, who was a physician, sev- 
 eral moved South and lived in Bryan and Lib- 
 erty Counties, Georgia; some permanently, as 
 William; some only in winter, as John Eatton. 
 
 William, a lawyer, lived partly in Savannah 
 and partly at " Sans Souci," his plantation on 
 the Ogeechee River. He took a very prominent 
 part in the revolutionary movement in Geor- 
 gia ; having been appointed a member of the 
 first Council of Safety for the Province of Geor- 
 gia, on June 22, 1775; and of the Provincial 
 Congress that met at Savannah on July 4 of 
 the same year. As a member of the Council, 
 he signed a letter of remonstrance directed to 
 Sir James Wright, Royal Governor of Georgia, 
 and was therefore named on the so-called " black- 
 list " that Sir James sent to King George ; he is 
 there termed " Rebel Counselor." He died in 
 Savannah without issue. 
 
 John Eatton, the second son, from whom 
 descended all subsequent Le Contes, was the 
 grandfather of the present writer. He was born 
 on September 2, 1739 ; and died in New Jersey 
 on January 4, 1822, when in his eighty-third 
 
 2 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 year. He spent his summers in New York and 
 his winters on his plantation, " Woodmanston," 
 in Liberty County, Georgia. How large a part 
 he took in the revolutionary struggle, I do not 
 know. I know, however, that he was regarded 
 as a malignant and a rebel, and that his house, 
 near the Barrington road, was burned by Colo- 
 nel Provost in his march through Liberty on 
 his way to the Indian territory. The ruins of 
 the old well are still visible, and a laurel-tree 
 (Magnolia grandiflora) that ornamented the 
 yard still stands. I find it recorded in the His- 
 tory of Georgia, moreover, that Dr. J. Le Conte 
 took charge of the provisions, etc., contributed 
 by Liberty County to the people of Boston, and 
 sent them by ship in 1775 and 1776. 
 
 He married Jane Sloane, of New York, and 
 the issue of the marriage was three sons — "Wil- 
 liam, Louis, and John Eatton, Jr. William died 
 without issue, in Liberty, in the house that was 
 afterward burned ; Louis was the father of Pro- 
 fessors John and Joseph Le Conte; and John 
 Eatton, Jr., the third son, was the father of 
 John L. Le Conte, of Philadelphia, the distin- 
 guished entomologist. 
 
 Louis, the father of the writer, was born in 
 Shrewsbury, N. J., on August 4, 1782. He was 
 
 3 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 educated in New York, graduating at Columbia 
 College in 1799, when he was but seventeen. He 
 studied medicine under Dr. Hosack, and at- 
 tained great knowledge and skill in that profes- 
 sion. He was called " doctor," but I think never 
 graduated as such, his only object in studying 
 medicine apparently being to practise it on his 
 own plantation. 
 
 John Eatton, Jr., remained in New York and 
 became a captain, and later major, in the corps 
 of topographical engineers of the United States 
 army; but Louis, some twelve years before the 
 death of his father, in 1810, when he was twen- 
 ty-eight, moved South and assumed the man- 
 agement of the property in Georgia. 
 
 Louis Le Conte was so remarkable a man 
 and his influence on the writer was so great that 
 it is necessary to dwell on his character and the 
 plantation life in Liberty. 
 
 The community of Liberty County was a 
 peculiar one. It was a colony of English Puri- 
 tans, who settled first in Dorchester, Mass., then 
 moved to Dorchester, S. C, and then, about 
 1750, to Liberty County. A Dorchester was 
 founded here also, but it was of little impor- 
 tance. As might be supposed from their origin, 
 these settlers were characterized equally by a 
 
 4 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 rigid orthodoxy and a love of liberty. The 
 name Liberty County was given in recognition 
 of the fact that the flag of independence was 
 there first raised in Georgia. It was character- 
 ized also as the most moral and religious, as 
 well as the most intelligent, community in Geor- 
 gia. The people were, however, very clannish 
 and exclusive. My father, of course, was an out- 
 sider, an interloper, not " one of the us " ; and 
 was therefore regarded askance for some time. 
 Although there finally grew up on both sides the 
 warmest feelings, although he finally secured 
 the deepest affection and reverence of the whole 
 community, yet he was of a different spirit and 
 never completely affiliated with them: he was 
 always somewhat of an outsider. In January, 
 1812, he married Ann Quarterman, a Puritan 
 born in the county in 1792 and therefore " one 
 of the us." The issue of this marriage was four 
 sons and three daughters. One of the daughters 
 died in infancy, but the other six children grew 
 up to marry and have families of their own. 
 
 v I was born on the plantation " Woodman- 
 ston," February 26, 1823, the fifth child and 
 youngest son. My mother died of pneumonia 
 in 1826, when I was but three years old. I can 
 not remember at all either her face or any event 
 
 5 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 of her life. The one thing concerning her that 
 I remember, the earliest event in the self-con- 
 scious history of my life,' was connected with 
 her death-bed. It was a bowl of blood standing 
 on the bureau of her bedroom. Doubtless it 
 deeply impressed me, and looking back now, it 
 seems ominous. It probably was her death-war- 
 rant. My father always thought so, the blood 
 having been drawn by the attending physicians 
 against his judgment. 
 
 I can not remember my father and mother 
 in their mutual relations, but my father must 
 have loved his wife passionately. The horror 
 of her death almost dethroned his reason, and 
 out of the resulting gloom and mental paralysis 
 he emerged only slowly and after many years. 
 Although I could not then understand its cause, 
 this feeling tinged all my early life with a mild 
 sadness. I remember well his silent gloom. I 
 remember well how he would snatch me up, 
 strain me to his heart, smother me with passion- 
 ate kisses, set me down quickly, rise and walk 
 rapidly about the room, sit down, and again re- 
 lapse into silence. Hence it was that I regarded 
 him with reverence and passionate love, but also 
 with awe and almost with fear. My mother was 
 buried in Midway churchyard, eight miles from 
 
 6 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 the plantation house. Every Sunday after 
 morning service and our cold lunch, he took one 
 or two of us boys — I was always one — and 
 walked in the cemetery to visit her grave. In 
 tearless silence he leaned on the railing and 
 gazed steadily fifteen or twenty minutes on the 
 simple mound ; then silently walked away, lead- 
 ing us by the hand. This he did every Sunday 
 as long as he lived — for twelve years. It was 
 during this period of gloom, when I was be- 
 tween three and four years old, that clear con- 
 sciousness of self dawned on me. 
 
 As the years passed and my father began to 
 take hold on life again, his children became 
 more companions to him. The awe and fear 
 of him diminished more and more, but the love 
 and reverence increased to greater and greater 
 passionateness. But his paroxysms of gloom 
 never entirely disappeared until his two eldest 
 children, William and Jane, married and had 
 children of their own. His joy in his grand- 
 children was boundless; it was a rejuvenation 
 to him. 
 
 In the early part of his lonely life, in order 
 to divert his thoughts from his grief, he fitted 
 up several rooms in the attic, especially one 
 large one, as a chemical laboratory. Day after 
 
 7 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 day, and sometimes all day, when not too much 
 busied in the administration of his large plan- 
 tation, he occupied himself with experimenting 
 there. I remember vividly how, when permitted 
 to be present, we boys followed him about silent- 
 ly and on tiptoe ; how we would watch the mys- 
 terious experiments ; with what awe his furnaces 
 and chauffers, his sand-baths, matrasses, and 
 alembics, and his precipitations filled us. Al- 
 though these experiments were undertaken in 
 the first instance to divert his mind from his 
 sorrow, yet his profound knowledge of chem- 
 istry, his deep interest and persistence, certain- 
 ly eventuated in important discoveries. Thus 
 diversion gradually ripened into intellectual de- 
 light. 
 
 It was during this time that he fell into a 
 low state of health without any assignable cause. 
 After some time he determined to try vegeta- 
 rianism, and for two years he absolutely avoided 
 flesh in any form. Feeling no effect, however, 
 he returned to the moderate use of meat, and 
 promptly recovered. His ill-health, I am sure, 
 was brought on, not by any fumes of the labora- 
 tory, as he imagined, but from anguish for the 
 loss of his wife. 
 
 My father always attended personally to his 
 8 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 place, on foot in winter, when living on the plan- 
 tation, on horseback when the family was at the 
 summer retreat, Jonesville, about three miles 
 away. But during the period of his ill-health 
 he was not able to attend to the duties of the 
 plantation and about two hundred slaves, so for 
 a year employed an overseer, the only one he 
 ever had. 
 
 Always fond of nature and science in all de- 
 partments, he now devoted himself more and 
 more ardently to the making and cultivation of 
 a botanical and floral garden. About an acre 
 of ground was set apart for this purpose and 
 much of his time, mornings and afternoons, was 
 spent there, "Daddy Dick," a faithful and in- 
 telligent old negro being employed under his 
 constant supervision in keeping it in order. 
 This large garden was the pride of my father. 
 Every day after his breakfast, he took his last 
 cup of coffee — his second or third — in his hand, 
 and walked about the garden, enjoying its 
 beauty and neatness and giving minute direc- 
 tions for its care and improvement. His espe- 
 cial pride was four or five camellia-trees — I say 
 trees, for even then they were a foot in diameter 
 and fifteen feet high. I have seen the largest 
 of these, a double white, with a thousand bios- 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 sohis open at once, each blossom four or five 
 inches in diameter, snow-white and double to 
 the center. In the vicinity of a large city such 
 a tree would now be worth a fortune, but my 
 father never thought — no one did then — of mak- 
 ing any profit from his flowers ; it was sufficient 
 to enjoy their beauty. 
 
 This garden was the joy and delight of my 
 childhood, and continued to be such through as- 
 sociation, long after his death and after it had 
 lost its beauty for want of his care. In 1896 
 I visited the old place again. It was a mere 
 wilderness, but the old camellia-tree still stood 
 covered with blossoms. I measured its girth; 
 ten inches from the ground, where the great 
 branches came off, it was fifty-six inches in cir- 
 cumference. 
 
 I have said that my father was devoted to 
 science. His knowledge of botany and chemis- 
 try was really profound. His beautiful garden 
 became celebrated all over the United States, 
 and botanists from the North and from Europe 
 came to visit it, always receiving welcome and 
 entertainment, sometimes for weeks, at his 
 house. On such occasions he would plan and 
 execute long excursions in the Altamaha region 
 for the purpose of collecting rare plants, the 
 
 10 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 places of which he well knew. These excursions 
 often occupied several days, and he stayed at 
 night at the cabins of the poor " crackers," all 
 of whom delighted to entertain him and his 
 friends. From these excursions he would re- 
 turn laden with treasures that he would help 
 his botanical friends to pack and send off. 
 
 As the Altamaha region was a comparative- 
 ly unexplored field, he discovered many new 
 plants, but he gave them freely to his scientific 
 friends. He loved nature and truth purely for 
 the sake of nature and truth, and never thought 
 of any personal advantage. I remember, more- 
 over, that he entirely ignored the custom of the 
 botanists of that time and anticipated the natural 
 classification. He always preferred to speak of 
 plants in connection with the natural rather 
 than the Linnsean system. In speaking of a 
 plant, he would give the Linnasan order, and then 
 add, " But it belongs to a natural order of such 
 a plant," giving the typical genus. 
 
 Although chemistry and botany were his 
 chief love, he was almost equally acquainted 
 with other departments of science, especially 
 zoology, physics, and mathematics. We boys 
 were passionately fond of gunning and fishing; 
 stimulated by his example and precept, we 
 
 11 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 brought everything strange or remarkable to 
 him to identify and name, which he easily did 
 by the use of his scientific library, ample for 
 that time. His delight and skill in mathematics 
 were remarkable. I remember in particular his 
 joy in working out mathematical puzzles, espe- 
 cially magic squares. When my brother Wil- 
 liam was in college, he sent my father several 
 questions in mathematics that had proved too 
 hard for the professor. He promptly solved 
 them and sent back the results. 
 
 With such predominance of scientific tastes, 
 it might be supposed that he was correspond- 
 ingly deficient in the classics. But not so, for 
 he was thoroughly acquainted with these also. 
 He read Latin at sight almost as readily as he 
 did English. Indeed I have never known any 
 one who used Latin so nearly as a native would. 
 
 So much for the intellectual character of 
 Louis Le Conte. But in moral character he was 
 no less remarkable. Indeed the best qualities 
 of character were constantly exercised and cul- 
 tivated in the just, wise, and kindly manage- 
 ment of his two hundred slaves. The negroes 
 were strongly attached to him, and proud of 
 calling him master. He cared not only for their 
 physical but also for their moral and religious 
 
 12 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 welfare. Some of the most distinguished cler- 
 gymen of that time, among whom I may men- 
 tion Dr. Charles Colcock Jones, the distin- 
 guished Presbyterian, and the Rev. Mr. Law, 
 the no less distinguished Baptist, devoted them- 
 selves in pure charity to missionary work 
 among the negroes. They established religious 
 organizations on every plantation, with their 
 " Praise Houses " (houses of worship built by 
 the planters) and negro preachers ordained by 
 the missionary ; and visited them regularly, go- 
 ing from plantation to plantation. As the serv- 
 ices were conducted at night, the minister was 
 entertained by the planter ; and I remember fre- 
 quent visits of this kind by Dr. Jones. 
 
 The planters found it necessary, however, to 
 supplement these religious influences with more 
 forcible methods of resistance. To prevent 
 roaming and drunkenness, they formed them- 
 selves into a mounted police that regularly 
 patrolled the county by night and arrested all 
 who were without passes. Prohibition laws 
 against the retail of spirits were enacted and 
 strictly enforced. There never was a more 
 orderly, nor apparently a happier, working class 
 than the negroes of Liberty County as I knew 
 them in my boyhood. 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 My father was active in all these methods 
 of moral improvement and of moral restraint, 
 but his deeply religious and actively sympa- 
 thetic nature showed itself in other and far 
 more unmistakable ways, especially in his 
 personal charities among the poor " pine knock- 
 ers " in the neighboring pine barrens of Mcin- 
 tosh County. These " pine knockers," or " crack- 
 ers," were a degraded and absolutely unpro- 
 gressive people. They lived in the most meager 
 way by planting small patches of corn, potatoes, 
 and cotton; and supplemented this means of 
 livelihood by shooting deer, and often the cattle 
 of their wealthier neighbors in Liberty County. 
 They were a pale, cadaverous people from want 
 of sufficient and proper food. My father, as 
 has already been said, was educated as a physi- 
 cian, although he never practised medicine ex- 
 cept on his own plantation and among these 
 poor people. Knowing that they could not em- 
 ploy a physician, he never refused to respond 
 to their calls for help, sometimes riding twenty 
 miles, carrying his own food and staying over 
 night in their miserable cabins. In several cases 
 of chronic trouble in children, due to bad food, 
 clothing, and housing, he took them to his own 
 home, kept them for months, and sent them back 
 
 14 
 
ANCESTEY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 cured. For all this he never thought of receiv- 
 ing any return. 
 
 My mother, as already said, I can not re- 
 member. All that I know of her appearance is 
 derived from a silhouette profile, said to be an 
 excellent likeness. It showed a strong face, 
 with high features and noble and refined char- 
 acter. A mother's love I never consciously 
 knew. But on her death all a mother's love was 
 transferred to my father, and he was henceforth 
 both father and mother to his children. Yet 
 who can say how much I owe to my mother; 
 how much of character may be formed before 
 three years of age, before the utmost limit of 
 memory? Who can tell how much we receive 
 by heredity? My mother was passionately fond 
 of art, and especially of music ; who can say how 
 much her cradle songs may have impressed my 
 innermost spiritual nature? My father's tastes, 
 on the other hand, were mainly scientific. To 
 this double inheritance, I suppose I owe my 
 equal fondness for science and art. 
 
 " Woodmanston " was situated on Bulltown 
 Swamp, the dividing line between Liberty and 
 Mcintosh Counties, the house itself being on a 
 kind of knoll that became an island at high 
 water. The situation was not healthy for 
 
 15 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 whites, and hence arose the necessity for sum- 
 mer retreats. In spite of the retreat the chil- 
 dren all suffered more or less from malarial 
 fevers, which were sometimes hard to break. Ill 
 health in my case led to contemplative, reflect- 
 ive, introspective habits. From this cause or 
 from natural tendency, I early became interested 
 in philosophical subjects. 
 
 The community, I have said, was intensely 
 religious. My mother — " one of the us " — was 
 also deeply and genuinely pious. Although so 
 sympathetic, self-sacrificing, and in the truest 
 sense religious, my father was not pious in the 
 ordinaiy sense. Caring little for observances, 
 forms of doctrine, or church organizations, he 
 never " professed religion " or connected him- 
 self with any church. Yet on his death I heard 
 the Rev. Dr. Axson say in the funeral sermon 
 that he never knew any one who in his life so 
 exemplified the principles of Christianity; that 
 in his opinion he was in the truest sense a 
 Christian. He was undoubtedly far ahead of 
 his time in his religious views, being liberal 
 without being skeptical. He was, however, reti- 
 cent on the subject, because he feared he would 
 be misunderstood. One concession he made to 
 his wife: about nine o'clock every night, before 
 
 16 
 
o 
 
 Pi 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 the children were sent to bed, he read aloud a 
 chapter from the Bible. This he kept up to the 
 time of his death. I remember well the pride 
 and alacrity with which one of us boys, taking 
 turns, would bring the big family Bible and lay 
 it on the table before him. 
 
 Such were the influences under which my 
 own religious nature grew. Hence it was that 
 I was first orthodox of the orthodox; later, as 
 thought germinated and grew apace, I adopted 
 a liberal interpretation of orthodoxy; then, 
 gradually I became unorthodox; then in deep 
 sympathy with the most liberal movement of 
 Christian thought; and finally, to some extent, 
 a leader in that movement. 
 
 Of all the influences determining my char- 
 acter and tastes, the personality of my father 
 was by far the most potent. Next in importance 
 to this, undoubtedly, was the freedom of my 
 boyhood life in a country abounding in game of 
 all sorts. This developed a passionate fondness 
 for nature in all departments and for field 
 sports of all kinds, with bow and arrow, with 
 gun, and with fishing-line. As I grew older this 
 love of nature took on higher forms ; first in the 
 study of ornithology, and later in camping 
 trips, undertaken partly in the spirit of adven- 
 3 17 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ture and partly for the geological study of 
 mountains. 
 
 I linger with especial delight on this early 
 plantation life, far from town and the busy hum 
 of men ; a life that has passed forever. It will 
 live for a time in the memory of a few, and 
 then only in history. It was, indeed, a very 
 paradise for boys. My father never forbade us 
 the use of firearms, but merely counseled their 
 careful use. The result justified the wisdom of 
 his method. Four of us boys with guns on our 
 shoulders all the time, and yet never an acci- 
 dent ! Guns there were a plenty in the house — 
 guns of all kinds, rifles and shot-guns, single- 
 barreled guns and double-barreled guns, mus- 
 kets and sporting guns, big guns, little guns, 
 and medium-sized guns, long guns and short 
 guns. There was a complete armory of them 
 up-stairs in one of the closets, besides several 
 in the hands of the most trusty negro men to 
 shoot game and wild animals of prey and crop- 
 destroying birds. There must have been at 
 least twenty of them. How they came there 
 was first revealed to us by a garrulous old negro 
 man named Samson. The story as told by him, 
 and in all essentials afterward confirmed by my 
 father, was as follows : 
 
 18 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 My grandfather, John Eatton Le Conte, as 
 already stated, was accustomed to spend his 
 winters on his Georgia plantation and his sum- 
 mers in New York. At this time — soon after 
 the War of the Revolution — the Indian country 
 was just over the Altamaha River, about fifteen 
 to twenty miles from the plantation. The in- 
 tervening country, now Mcintosh County, was 
 pine barren and almost uninhabited. It was a 
 sort of neutral ground, a no-man's land. The 
 Indians had several times raided the rich plan- 
 tations of Liberty, and escaped again into the 
 Indian territory on the other side of the Alta- 
 maha. Their success had emboldened them, and 
 as our plantation was on the south border of 
 Liberty it was peculiarly exposed. 
 
 My grandfather had prepared for attack by 
 building a stockade and fortifying it with old 
 revolutionary muskets, and had given directions 
 to the negroes to seek shelter there in case of 
 a raid. One day about noon, the negroes came 
 running toward the fort in great alarm, closely 
 pursued by the Indians to the very door. Most 
 of the negroes got in safely, but one powerful 
 negro man was seized by two Indians just at 
 the door. In the struggle, all fell together to 
 the ground, the negro beneath. My grandfather 
 
 19 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 fired a load of buckshot at the struggling mass ; 
 the two Indians were instantly killed, but the 
 negro springing up entered the fort. He had 
 been grazed across the chest by a shot, but not 
 hurt. Then commenced a regular battle, lasting 
 two or three hours, the Indians, several hun- 
 dreds, fighting with their bows and arrows, and 
 the garrison with muskets. I wish I could give 
 in Samson's words a description of the battle — 
 how my grandfather with a few of the bravest 
 negroes, stood at the loopholes, fired, handed 
 back the empty muskets to be reloaded, took 
 loaded ones in their stead, and fired again. Fi- 
 nally, the Indian chief, in his eagerness to en- 
 courage his braves to storm the fort, unwarily 
 exposed himself, and was brought down with a 
 broken leg by a shot. The Indians immediately 
 made a bold dash, carried off their chief, took 
 horses from the stable, bound the chief on one of 
 them, and hastily fled, carrying their dead and 
 wounded with them. They did not go, however, 
 without booty. According to Samson's account, 
 three negro women and Samson himself were 
 captured before they could reach the fort, and 
 were carried away by the Indians in their flight. 
 The Liberty troop hearing of the raid, organ- 
 ized and pursued, but, as they supposed, never 
 
 20 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 overtook them. Samson, however, told a dif- 
 ferent story. According to him, they did over- 
 take the Indians, but these lay concealed and 
 watched the troop pass by, taking the precau- 
 tion, however, of grasping the throats of their 
 prostrate prisoners with one hand, while they 
 brandished a glittering knife with the other. 
 
 Samson was in the Indian territory for 
 three years, and then came back to the planta- 
 tion and was made one of the head men there. 
 He says the Indians treated their captives well, 
 quite as equals, especially the women, whom 
 they took as wives. These never came back, be- 
 cause they had children to care for. Samson, 
 according to his own story, ran away several 
 times, and was recaptured; but finally succeed- 
 ed in getting back. In telling this story, which 
 he did very often, the old man would become 
 so excited that the foam would fly from his lips. 
 A short account of this raid is given in White's 
 Historical Collections of Georgia, but all the in- 
 teresting details given by Samson were un- 
 known, and are now given for the first time. 
 
 Concerning my education, the really best I 
 got was informal. First and most important of 
 all was the daily companionship of my father. 
 Next to this was the many mechanical opera- 
 
 21 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tions going on continually on the plantation ; 
 and third, the unlimited freedom of the planta- 
 tion life far away from city ways, and directed 
 only by a wise father. Of the first of these, I 
 have already said enough. A few words now on 
 the two others. 
 
 In these early days, everything was done on 
 the plantation. There were tanneries in which 
 the hides of slaughtered cattle were made into 
 leather. There was a shoemaker's shop, where 
 from the leather made on the place the shoes 
 for all the negroes were made by negro shoe- 
 makers. There were blacksmith and carpenter 
 shops, where all the work needed on the plan- 
 tation was done by negro blacksmiths and car- 
 penters. All the rice raised on the plantation 
 was thrashed, winnowed, and beaten by ma- 
 chinery made on the spot, driven by horse- 
 power, and the horses by negro boys. All the 
 cotton was ginned and cleaned and packed 
 on the place. As the cotton was Sea Island, 
 or long-staple, Whitney's invention was of no 
 use, and only roller gins could be used, at 
 first, foot-gins, and later horse-gins. For the 
 same reason — viz., the fineness of the staple — 
 the cotton was all packed by hand and foot, the 
 packer standing in the suspended bag. All these 
 
 22 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 operations of tanning, shoemaking, blacksmith- 
 ing, carpentering, the thrashing, winnowing, 
 and beating of rice, and the ginning, cleaning, 
 and packing of cotton, were watched with in- 
 tensest interest by us boys, and often we gave 
 a helping hand ourselves. There was always 
 especial interest in the ginning of cotton by foot 
 and the thrashing of the rice by flail, because 
 these were carried on by great numbers work- 
 ing together, the one by women, and the other 
 by men, and always with singing and shouting 
 and keeping time with the work. The negroes 
 themselves enjoyed it hugely. 
 
 Far away from any city as we were, what- 
 ever we wanted we were compelled to make. If 
 we wanted marbles, we made them, and excellent 
 marbles they were. If we wanted kites, we 
 made them, and none better were ever made. 
 We, of course, wanted bows and arrows — we 
 therefore made them, as fine bows and as ex- 
 quisitely finished arrows as I have ever seen. 
 We had an ambition to have pistols; we made 
 them also, and here it may be interesting to 
 trace the evolution of the pistol as I observed 
 it myself. First, little lead cannons were cast 
 in a paper mold over a rod of wood. Then 
 these were mounted as lead pistols, touched off 
 
 23 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 by a sort of match-lock. This was as far as 
 most of ns went ; but one of my brothers, Lewis, 
 had remarkable mechanical talent. Not satisfied 
 with such crude results, he continued to improve 
 his firearms. First, he cast the lead on iron 
 gas tubes, drilled out to smooth bore. Then he 
 improved these by fitting to the gas tube a 
 breeching of iron, with chamber and touch-hole 
 drilled out, and casting lead over all; then he 
 enlarged the pistol to rifle size, adding lock, 
 spring, hammer, and nipple, all of which he 
 made himself; then he mounted this barrel on 
 a beautiful stock of bird's-eye maple, with 
 guard and trigger and grease-box complete, and 
 trimmed it with an alloy of lead, zinc, and anti- 
 mony of his own manufacture. The whole 
 was beautifully chased and engraved with tools 
 of his own making. The final result was as 
 beautiful a rifle as I ever saw, and as efficient 
 too. With this rifle I have seen him bring down 
 a squirrel from the top of a hundred-foot tree, 
 with a bullet through its brain. 
 
 This same brother when a boy twelve years 
 old made the most exquisite bows and arrows, 
 and I have known him to bring home to break- 
 fast eight or ten birds as the fruits of his won- 
 derful archery. 
 
 24 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 Still another, and most important part, of 
 this informal education was the free plantation 
 life with unlimited game and fish. As has been 
 said, if anything unusual was got, whether fish 
 or fowl or reptile or mammal or even insect, 
 we were sure to bring it home for father to 
 name. This kind of life is an admirable culture 
 for a boy. It not only contributes to physical 
 health but also to mental health, by continual 
 contact with nature and by cultivation of the 
 powers of observation. In addition, it culti- 
 vates in an admirable way quick perception, 
 prompt decision, and persistent energy and pa- 
 tience in pursuit. In the ardor of duck-hunting, 
 I have been compelled to creep on hands and 
 knees for hours to secure the quarry. 
 
 I know well that there is much to be said 
 against the destruction of life for sport. I felt 
 this myself, even as a boy. I well remember 
 that at the age of eleven, when I first began to 
 carry a gun, one of my earliest triumphs was 
 that of bringing down a gray squirrel from the 
 top of a tall tree. But my triumph was quickly 
 changed into keenest remorse when I saw it 
 convulsed and dying at my feet. Habit, excite- 
 ment of the chase, fulness of physical health 
 and animal spirits, dulled, but never wholly 
 
 25 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 quenched, my keen sympathy with animal suf- 
 fering. I was taught by my father, and im- 
 pelled by my own nature, never to destroy life 
 for mere sport. Sport enough there was, but 
 always in accomplishing some ulterior and use- 
 ful purpose. 
 
 This was in boyhood; now, in my old age, 
 with decline of intense vitality, all the tender- 
 ness of my sympathy with animal life returns 
 in full force. I can no longer take the least 
 pleasure in shooting or in seeing shooting, not 
 only because the pleasure of physical activity 
 is less, but also because my sympathy with all 
 life is more keen. 
 
 Many who may read the above will conclude 
 that I am an awii-vivisectionist. Not so. Un- 
 doubtedly our sympathy with life ought to be 
 universal, and the more, the better. Yes, but it 
 ought to be in exact proportion to the grade of life. 
 I would, I ought to, destroy a thousand fleas for 
 the comfort of a faithful dog. So, also, I ought 
 to be willing to destroy a thousand dogs for the 
 health and well-being of man. Of course it 
 should be with the least suffering possible un- 
 der the circumstances. But remember, that 
 suffering, too, is in proportion to the grade of life. 
 It is not true that 
 
 26 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 The poor beetle that we tread upon, 
 
 In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great 
 
 As when a giant dies. 
 
 Other sports, less objectionable, we bad in 
 plenty. When I was about ten years old, the 
 three younger boys, John, Lewis, and I, under- 
 took, with the help of an intelligent and inge- 
 nious negro man, Primus, and with the permis- 
 sion of father to use Primus for this purpose, 
 to make a fine dugout canoe out of a large cy- 
 press log three feet in diameter. We were sev- 
 eral months making it, but when finished, it was 
 a large and beautiful canoe. The amount of joy 
 we got out of that canoe was incalculable. 
 Whole days were spent in the exploration of 
 the great swamp on which the plantation was 
 situated. I am sure we felt, on a small scale, all 
 the joy and pride of discoverers of unknown 
 lands. During the times of high water by win- 
 ter freshets, the rice-fields, at that time bare of 
 rice, formed a splendid sheet of water two miles 
 long and half a mile wide. We sometimes 
 rigged a mast and sail, but as the canoe was not 
 suited to this kind of propulsion, we often suf- 
 fered shipwreck in water two or three feet deep. 
 But to a boy this only gave zest to the enjoy- 
 ment. Much of our duck-hunting was done in 
 
 27 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 this canoe, and I became very expert in the use 
 of the paddle and in the management of a canoe. 
 
 As might be supposed, in a warm climate 
 and by an abundance of water, swimming, too, 
 was a favorite sport. I very early learned to 
 swim. I was a good swimmer at ten; and in 
 early manhood, I never knew a better swimmer, 
 and but few equal to myself. Even now at 
 seventy-seven, my swimming is a marvel to the 
 onlooker. I do not at all exaggerate when I say 
 that to me swimming is still as easy, and I think 
 perhaps a little easier, than walking. The rea- 
 son is obvious. I am of slender frame, long 
 limbs, small bones, and large lungs. I can now 
 throw out more than three hundred cubic inches 
 of air. The specific gravity of my body is less 
 than that of water, even fresh water. I can, 
 therefore, lie motionless floating on the water, 
 breathing perfectly naturally, for any length of 
 time — I believe I could go to sleep. Of course 
 then the least exertion properly applied pro- 
 duces easy and graceful locomotion. 
 
 During my boyhood there were on the plan- 
 tation three very old negroes who were native 
 Africans and remembered their African home. 
 They were Sessy, a little old man bent almost 
 double; Nancy, an old woman with filed teeth; 
 
 28 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 and Charlotte, who left Africa, according to her 
 own account, when she was about twelve. All 
 of them, of course, were superannuated and 
 taken care of without any remuneration. Sessy 
 was extravagantly fond of alligator meat, and 
 always begged us boys to bring him the tails 
 of any alligators we might kill. Small alliga- 
 tors, six and seven feet long, abounded in the 
 swamp, and we never failed to shoot them 
 whenever we could, as they were great destroy- 
 ers of fish, and, although we cared little for 
 them, interfered somewhat with our swimming. 
 Now and then longer and more dangerous ones 
 appeared; the largest we ever killed was four- 
 teen feet long. This one was drawn out of his 
 hole during low water in the swamp, by a hook 
 attached to a long pole, and about twenty-five 
 negro men ahold of the pole. It was great 
 sport, and I often afterward told the story to 
 my children. 
 
 There was also on a neighboring plantation 
 an old native African named Philip, who was a 
 very intelligent man. He used to tell us all 
 about the customs and religion of the country 
 from which he came. He was not a pagan, but 
 a Mohammedan. He greatly interested us by 
 going through all the prayers and prostrations 
 
 29 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 of his native country. He also gave us the nu- 
 merals up to twenty; these were, of course, na- 
 tive African, not Arabic. They were : go, dede, 
 tata, nigh, ja, ja go, ja ded, ja tata, ja nigh, 
 suppe, suppa go, suppa dede, suppa tata, suppa 
 nigh, suppa ja, suppa ja go, suppa ja dede, 
 suppa ja tata, suppa ja nigh. It is seen that 
 they counted by fives and not by tens, as we do. 
 As to formal education, all the schooling I 
 got was in a neighborhood country school, of 
 all grades and both sexes, supported by four or 
 five families, and of the most desultory kind. 
 During nine years of schooling, I had just nine 
 different teachers. Only one of them had any 
 special influence on me, and that was Alexander 
 H. Stephens, who afterward, as Governor of the 
 State, as Eepresentative in Congress, and as 
 Vice-President of the Confederate States, re- 
 ceived every honor that his State could con- 
 fer on him. A poor boy, he received his col- 
 legiate education by the charity of a church 
 society of women. He commenced life as a 
 teacher, and for two years I had the privilege 
 of being his pupil. His appearance at that 
 time lives in my memory. He used to join 
 with us in our ball-playing. I see him now in 
 his shirt-sleeves, bat in hand, with his tall, 
 
 30 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 slender form, frail and thin to painful meager- 
 ness, and his pale, corpse-like face. How he 
 would laugh and shake his gaunt sides when 
 he ma'de a good strike, and still more when we 
 beat him! One thing about him is especially- 
 worthy of mention as influencing his pupils for 
 good, his utter detestation of lying, deceit, and 
 meanness of every kind. He never encouraged 
 tale-bearing, but always openly reproved it. I 
 remember that once my brother Lewis thrashed 
 a boy of his own size severely, and was caught 
 in the act by the teacher. Both boys were, of 
 course, brought up for trial; but when my 
 brother told the reason why he beat the other 
 boy, viz., that he had called him a liar, Stephens 
 promptly dismissed the case, with the remark 
 that Lewis was perfectly right. Thus he cul- 
 tivated in his scholars the sense of self-respect 
 and honor; in our case only emphasizing the 
 influence which we got at home. 
 
 Since those early days, I have frequently 
 met Mr. Stephens, sometimes in Georgia, some- 
 times in South Carolina, and sometimes in 
 Washington, and in all these places, both before 
 and after the war between the States, I never 
 met him but he referred with pleasure to the 
 school days in Liberty. He had the most pro- 
 
 31 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGKAPHY 
 
 found admiration for my father. Indeed my 
 father's personality was a revelation to him. 
 He had never seen nor conceived of anything 
 like it before. He always said that association 
 with him had profoundly influenced his own 
 character and career. 
 
 The school course in those days was ex- 
 tremely simple. Beyond the " three R's," it 
 was simply Greek, through Xenophon; Latin 
 through Livy; and mathematics, through alge- 
 bra and geometry. I took pleasure in all these, 
 but especially in the mathematics. The school- 
 house (a mere rough board shanty, put up by 
 the planters interested) was small, and consist- 
 ed of but one room. The big boys, those of 
 twelve years and upward, were allowed in 
 pleasant weather to study out of doors, under 
 the trees or in the broom-grass, according to 
 the temperature. Study, therefore, was wholly 
 without oversight, but I think none the less 
 faithful on that account. Education being along 
 few lines, advanced rapidly, and I was already 
 well prepared for the freshman class of college 
 at fourteen years. But my father thought that 
 I was too young to leave home; so I spent an- 
 other year in reviewing all my Latin, Greek, 
 and mathematics, and entered college at fifteen. 
 
 32 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 The different plantations interested in the 
 school were far apart, the extremes being at least 
 three miles. We boys and one sister had to 
 walk about a mile and a half. We took with us 
 a cold dinner in a tin bucket, therefore; and a 
 negro boy always accompanied us to carry the 
 bucket, and to wait on us at school, if necessary. 
 The negro boy always considered it a great 
 honor to be selected from among the five or six 
 about the yard, whose business it was to cut up 
 wood for the house and the kitchen and to wait 
 on the cook. This attendance of a servant at 
 school was considered by the other scholars as a 
 rather " swell " proceeding, and our family was 
 unique in this regard. There was really little 
 or no service rendered, however, the boy being 
 rather a companion in our sports, and usually 
 a great favorite with all the scholars. School 
 continued from nine in the morning to four in 
 the afternoon, with an interval of an hour at 
 noon for lunch and games. In the long days of 
 May, just before moving to the summer retreat, 
 Jonesville, we boys would hurry home, in order 
 to enjoy a little gunning or fishing or swimming 
 before supper. 
 
 I might give many details of these school 
 days in Liberty that it seems to me could be 
 4 33 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 made as interesting as Mr. Hughes's account of 
 Tom Brown's school-days at Rugby. I will 
 give only one incident, showing the moral tone 
 of the school. It was supported mainly by 
 three families, the Le Contes, the Joneses, and 
 the Varnedoes; but a gentleman living at Rice- 
 boro, about a mile distant, asked the priv- 
 ilege of sending his boy, Rush, to it. Rush 
 was a handsome, bright boy of about twelve, in 
 dress almost a dandy in comparison with the 
 rest of us. He had been at other schools, where 
 he had learned some bad words and ways. At 
 first he was on his good behavior, and we all 
 liked him, but gradually he began to use bad 
 language in the presence of the girls. Finally, 
 they determined to punish him. The boys en- 
 tered into the conspiracy so far as to agree to 
 throw him down on his face, and then to deliver 
 him over to the girls. After we had thrown 
 him, a very strong and heavy girl laid her 
 weight across his shoulders, and my sister 
 Anne laid the switch on him well, until in the 
 struggle, he got hold of the hand of the girl ly- 
 ing across his shoulders and bit it severely, and 
 it all ended in a good cry on both sides. But 
 it cured Rush effectually of his bad habits, and 
 he became a great favorite. Soon after this 
 
 34 
 
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, BOYHOOD 
 
 the school broke up, to reassemble at Jonesville, 
 and we saw no more of Rush. This was about 
 1835. In 1863, eighteen years afterward, when 
 Rush was a graduate of West Point and a lieu- 
 tenant in the Confederate army, my sister met 
 him again, and they talked of the occurrence, 
 he, of course, bringing up the subject. On this 
 occasion he showed his manliness by acknowl- 
 edging his fault, and thanking her for the pun- 
 ishment. It taught him a lesson, he said, that 
 he had never forgotten. 
 
 I finished my schooling in December, 1837, 
 and was ready to go to college. Up to that time 
 Lewis and I had never been farther from the 
 plantation home than Midway church, eight 
 miles. Up to that time we had never worn any 
 other than boy's clothes — i. e., round jacket, 
 limp, open collar, soft cap, and often even bare 
 feet. Now we had to put on the toga virilis : swal- 
 low-tailed coat, stiff stock, and beaver hat. It 
 is easy to imagine how queer we looked, and 
 how awkward we felt when we put them on the 
 first time to go to church. We could not look 
 at one another without bursting out with laugh- 
 ter. In these days the change is gradual, but 
 then it was as sudden and complete as the meta- 
 morphosis of a chrysalis to a butterfly. 
 
 35 
 
■fy 
 
 JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 On the ninth day of January, 1838, the very 
 day set for us to leave for college, rny father 
 died, after a short illness from blood-poisoning, 
 and in the prime of life, being but fifty-five 
 years and five months old. This delayed our 
 departure a week. 
 
 The death of my father simply stunned me 
 — I was dazed ; I could not realize it. I remem- 
 ber well that as a child I sometimes lay awake 
 at night thinking of death, not so much of my 
 own as of that of those I loved. It seemed to 
 me that I might possibly be able to bear that 
 of brother or sister, but my father's possible 
 death filled me with terror. I simply shut it 
 out of my mind as a thing I could not, I must 
 not, think about. And now the thing I most 
 dreaded had come to pass. He died about four 
 in the afternoon. All the next day I wandered 
 alone in the beautiful, beloved garden in a state 
 of stupor, of mental paralysis. He was buried 
 in Midway churchyard by the side of the wife 
 he loved so devotedly. I have already alluded 
 to the sermon preached by the Rev. Dr. Axson 
 and the tribute to his character. 
 
 36 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 COLLEGE LIFE; CHOICE OF A PROFESSION; 
 FIRST LOVE 
 
 On the 16th of January, 1838, we started 
 for college, John, Lewis, and I. John had al- 
 ready been in college three years, and was now 
 in the senior class. Lewis and I were leaving 
 home for the first time. Everything was new 
 to me, so in spite of my recent sorrow I was 
 ashamed to find my spirits rapidly reviving. 
 Though Athens was but three hundred miles 
 distant, we were a week on the road, for the 
 journey was all by stage, except twenty miles on 
 the newly made Georgia Railroad, the first in the 
 State. There is very little to be said of the tedi- 
 ous journey. Two incidents on the way may, per- 
 haps, be worth mentioning, as showing my ex- 
 treme inexperience and the moral influences 
 under which I had been reared. 
 
 We took stage from Savannah to Augusta, 
 one hundred and twenty miles. There was but 
 
 37 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 one passenger besides ourselves, a well-dressed, 
 courteous, educated gentleman, returning home 
 from a visit to Savannah. He had a bottle of 
 brandy along, which he too often used. He was 
 evidently very drunk, and became more and 
 more maudlin as we went on. He talked inces- 
 santly of his wife, and of how good a woman 
 she was — much too good for him; and as he 
 approached his house, began to shed tears. 
 Finally, about a mile from his destination, he 
 declared he could not go home; he could not 
 bear that his wife should see him in his present 
 condition. He stopped the stage, bade us good- 
 by with many warnings against the vice that 
 had enslaved him, and got off at a wayside inn. 
 
 I mention this only to say how it affected 
 me; instead of amusing me, as it might some, 
 it made me inexpressibly sad. I had never seen 
 a drunken white man before. I had seen two 
 or three drunken negroes, and had associated 
 drunkenness with the lowest characters, so to 
 see a respectable man debase himself thus was 
 to me awfully tragic. 
 
 Another incident may be worth mention. As 
 we approached Athens, belated students began 
 to drop into the stage. Belated students are 
 not apt to be good students ; some of these were 
 
 38 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 among the worst elements in college. Seeing at 
 a glance that we, Lewis and I, were " green- 
 horns," they took delight in astonishing us with 
 ribald jests and obscene songs. I was not at 
 all anmsed, but simply disgusted. I may add 
 here, that for me the so-called dangers of col- 
 lege life never existed. I saw much of vicious 
 conduct among students, of course, but whether 
 such example injures or not, depends entirely 
 upon inheritance and early training. For my- 
 self, I never felt the least temptation to join 
 in vicious courses, nor have I ever been enticed 
 by others to join in such courses. College stu- 
 dents are not so bad as some seem to think. 
 They never deliberately try to lead any one 
 astray. They simply seek congenial associa- 
 tion. Indeed I believe that college is the safest 
 of all places for young men. It is impossible 
 always to remain in the bomb-proof of home. 
 One must go out into the world and fight the 
 battle of life. Now, college young men are a 
 picked set, far better and safer than the aver- 
 age. 
 
 I repeat, therefore, that I had no tempta- 
 tions in college worth speaking of. In fact, 
 from early training, and especially perhaps 
 from an instinct of possible danger, I avoided 
 
 39 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 many things then which I afterward freely 
 practised. For example, during my whole col- 
 lege course I never touched a card, but I have 
 used them ever since in my family as an inno- 
 cent source of amusement. Again, during my 
 whole college course I never touched intoxicat- 
 ing drinks of any kind. Now I use wine on my 
 table every day, and never forbid it to my chil- 
 dren if they desire it. Instead of sowing any 
 wild oats and reforming afterward, I have 
 steadily become more and more liberal in my 
 thoughts and feelings about such things. This 
 is, I believe, as it ought to be. Vice is mere 
 weakness; evil consists in mere abuse; but in 
 early life strength is not yet acquired. Rational 
 use is not easy, and therefore had better not be 
 attempted, except under the shelter of the home 
 roof. 
 
 Brought up in the country and never having 
 wandered farther than eight miles from the 
 family hearthstone, when I arrived at college 
 my thoughts reverted with force to the old 
 home and its surroundings, and for several 
 months I suffered severely from nostalgia. 
 My yearning for the old plantation and the 
 beautiful garden was intense. It was during 
 this time that I received letters from my eldest 
 
 40 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 brother William that distressed me beyond 
 measure. One of the noblest of men, since 
 my father's death he had been my guardian, 
 in loco parentis, and was very dear to me. He 
 was a thoroughly religious man, and, of course, 
 of the old orthodox type. He felt deeply the 
 duty of improving the sad occasion of my fa- 
 ther's death to urge upon me the absolute neces- 
 sity of " fleeing from the wrath to come," and 
 now! now! He alluded with distress and 
 doubt to my father's dying outside the pale 
 of the church. I have one letter yet. It dis- 
 tressed me greatly then; it distresses me to read 
 it now, but for very different reasons ; then, be- 
 cause it brought vividly before me the dread 
 hereafter ; now, because of the mistaken narrow- 
 ness of a good man. I appreciate the intense 
 affection, but recognize now the mistaken meth- 
 od. The affection was all his own ; the mistaken 
 method belonged to the time, not the man. My 
 brother was one of the strongest, most practical, 
 most rational and level-headed men I ever knew. 
 During a religious revival in the churches, 
 when I was in the junior class, Lewis and I, 
 with a large number of other students, joined 
 the church. Our church at Midway, Liberty 
 County, was Puritan-Congregationalist. There 
 
 41 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 was no church of that kind at Athens, The 
 nearest to it in faith was the Presbyterian. My 
 friends did not think it well to wait until we re- 
 turned to Liberty; the Presbyterian was good 
 enough. Thus it was that I became a Presby- 
 terian instead of a Congregationalist. Indeed 
 the history of our family was peculiar in this 
 regard. My ancestors were, of course, Hugue- 
 nots by blood and faith. In early colonial times, 
 the Huguenot church in New York became at 
 one time so weak financially, that it was com- 
 pelled to save itself from extinction by putting 
 itself under the protection of the English Colo- 
 nial Government, and became Episcopal. It so 
 remained ever after in New York. The old 
 Huguenot church, in which are registered the 
 births, deaths, and marriages of my ancestors 
 back to the original Guillaume, the " Eglise de 
 St. Esprit," is still a French Episcopal church. 
 On coming to Georgia, where there was no Epis- 
 copal church, my father attended regularly the 
 Congregational church at Midway, of which my 
 mother was a member, and of which my elder 
 brother and sister also became members. My 
 father never connected himself with the church, 
 although all the children were baptized there. 
 Circumstances, already mentioned, connected 
 
 42 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 Lewis and me with the Presbyterian. It is not 
 strange, then, that with such a family history 
 I care little for denominational differences. Of 
 my own children, one is a Presbyterian, two 
 are Episcopalians, and one not a member of 
 any church, and that one is as good, for all I 
 can see, as any of them. 
 
 This revival, and my union with the church, 
 was undoubtedly a very great crisis in my life. 
 If there ever was a case of sudden, almost mi- 
 raculous conversion, mine was one. I passed 
 through all the stages described in such cases — 
 a period of great distress, of earnest prayer, of 
 exercise of faith, followed by a sudden sense of 
 acceptance, an intense ecstatic joy for deliver- 
 ance, and a trust in and love of the Deliverer. 
 The sense of the fatherhood of God and the 
 brotherhood of man was vivid and full of de- 
 light. Life took on a new and glorious signifi- 
 cance. All men became dearer to me, and even 
 nature assumed a new and more beautiful ap- 
 pearance. Literally there was a new heaven and 
 a new earth. The sky was never before so blue, 
 the clouds so grandly massy and white, the 
 grass so freshly green, nor the stars so bright. 
 The sense of joy was so great that my heart 
 seemed to swell almost to bursting. 
 
 43 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 But the real permanent change was a sense 
 of deliverance from the bondage of the fear of 
 death and the hereafter, which, under the spell 
 of the old orthodoxy, had always, in thoughtful 
 moments, oppressed me. My spirit was set 
 free. I was now the child of God and the brother 
 of Jesus. I had now a really noble object in 
 life, an ideal to be sought, an evil to be fought 
 against. This I have never lost. It has been 
 the most powerful element in the formation of 
 character and the determination of conduct. 
 However much I may have changed my opinion 
 as to the miraculousness of the process, this 
 change of relation toward the spiritual world 
 has remained as an eternal heritage. Delusion ! 
 some will say. No, it was the old fear that was 
 the delusion. The change was not the establish- 
 ing of a new relation, but the discovery of the 
 true relation which existed. 
 
 After my connection with the church and 
 during my winter vacations of two and a half 
 months, my brother William often talked to me 
 very earnestly of my possible duty, " if I felt 
 called," to become a minister of the Gospel. In- 
 deed many of my friends to this day think that 
 I have missed my calling, that I ought to have 
 been a preacher. At that time I did think very 
 
 44 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 seriously of it, but my scientific tastes prevailed, 
 and carried me toward medicine instead; and I 
 have never regretted it. One may be a preacher 
 of righteousness in more ways than one. 
 
 Among the educating influences of college 
 life, I must not omit the literary societies. Fra- 
 ternities, such as now exist, there were none at 
 that time, but only semi-secret societies for lit- 
 erary exercises and for debates. There were, 
 of course, two rival societies, called respectively 
 " Demosthenian " and " Phi Kappa," to one or 
 the other of which all the students belonged. I 
 was a Phi Kappa. I have seen nothing in col- 
 leges since that time at all equal to these. The 
 interest in them was so great that Saturday, a 
 holiday in college exercises, was often entirely 
 consumed in debates ; and when the question was 
 a living one, I have known the debates to con- 
 tinue until midnight. They were an excellent 
 training for public life, and were therefore en- 
 couraged by the faculty and stimulated by al- 
 lowing the two societies to choose one-half of the 
 eight junior orators, i. e., two by each society, 
 for commencement exhibition. The best results 
 of these societies I never attained. I was too 
 young and sensitive, too easily embarrassed to 
 make a good debater. Even to this day I am 
 
 45 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 not a ready speaker, although I have spoken so 
 much; even now I must elaborately prepare. 
 My brother Lewis, on the contrary, though far 
 less distinguished in the classes, was a very 
 fearless and successful debater. 
 
 Games and gymnasiums as a regular part 
 of college work, and hence regular organiza- 
 tions of students for athletics, were unknown 
 at that time. Athletics and games there were 
 indeed a plenty, but as purely spontaneous ex- 
 pressions of abounding vitality. I was light, 
 active, and fleet of foot, and became very expert 
 in gymnastics and as a player of town-ball, for 
 baseball and cricket had not yet evolved. 
 
 To me, at this time, a most important means 
 of culture was the society of ladies. The ladies 
 of Athens were celebrated for their beauty and 
 refinement, and it was the habit of the students 
 to cultivate the acquaintance of the ladies of the 
 families of the faculty and of other families in 
 the town. Refined women were to me then, and 
 I confess to something of the same feeling yet, 
 a sort of superior beings, belonging to another, 
 higher, and purer sphere of existence. I sim- 
 ply worshiped them. Association with them 
 produced in me a delicious delirium, an ecstatic 
 joy and exaltation. I have much of the same 
 
 46 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 feeling yet, although moderated and purged of 
 its extravagance by experience. In these days 
 it has become the fashion to ridicule this ro- 
 mantic feeling toward women, but there can be 
 no doubt it is the greatest of all safeguards of 
 the purity of young men. 
 
 I never had any great ambition to excel my 
 fellows in the classes. I was, moreover, too 
 young to appreciate the highest motives of 
 study. There were, therefore, only two mo- 
 tives that determined such diligence as I showed 
 — viz., a desire to please my instructors and a 
 real taste in the subject of study. This latter 
 was the main motive in mathematics, mechanics, 
 and physics, and, in the last year, in mental and 
 moral philosophy. The subjects of my ad- 
 dresses as junior orator in 1840, and again as 
 senior orator in 1841, on the occasion of my 
 graduation, of which I remember little except 
 their extreme immaturity, show this double tend- 
 ency of my mind toward science and moral 
 philosophy. The title of the one was True 
 Greatness, which I took to be mainly moral 
 worth ; of the other, Love of Truth, the Highest 
 Incentive to Effort. Both of these I burned 
 many years ago in disgust at their almost child- 
 ish crudity and immaturity. I wish now I had 
 
 47 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 preserved them. We grow more tolerant as we 
 grow older. The fact is, my ability to write 
 anything of any value came very late. I never 
 was, and am not now, a facile writer. For me, 
 a written production of any kind is literally a 
 piece of thought work. It is not, however, a 
 manufactured article, but a child of the brain. 
 It is not made, but born — born of much labor 
 and with many throes. Of course, therefore, I 
 never could write until I had independent 
 thoughts of my own. The skilful putting to- 
 gether of the commonplaces of literature into a 
 brilliant patchwork is a thing I could never do. 
 
 The natural history sciences, which the ex- 
 ample of my father had made my first love, were 
 almost wholly neglected during my college 
 course, because this side of science was the most 
 feebly represented in the faculty. I only re- 
 turned to it through the study of medicine, much 
 later. 
 
 There was but one man in the faculty who 
 was in any way remarkable, and whose person- 
 ality strongly impressed me — viz., Charles P. 
 McCay. He was an excellent mathematician 
 and mechanician, and well versed also in phys- 
 ics. He was the most skilful oral examiner I 
 ever knew: his Socratic method of drawing 
 
 48 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 out knowledge or of exposing ignorance was 
 really marvelous ; I have never known anything 
 like it. I was afterward, from 1853 to 1857, as- 
 sociated with him as colleague, and became very 
 intimately acquainted with him, and learned to 
 admire him. 
 
 My college life was uneventful. I was, in- 
 deed, full of life and spirit, and enjoyed my 
 college days to the full; but I have no college 
 pranks to relate. I had little fancy for such, 
 because I did not regard them as indicative of 
 spirit and courage. One single incident I men- 
 tion. 
 
 It was my last year in college. I was pre- 
 paring for my part in the commencement exer- 
 cises, although I was then only eighteen — a mere 
 slender slip of a boy. My brother Lewis, then 
 twenty, was in love with a young lady, the one 
 
 he afterward married. A young man, P , was 
 
 also in love with the same girl. One evening 
 about 9 p. m., Lewis and I were passing the col- 
 lege dormitory, each with a lady on his arm; 
 Lewis, of course, with his lady-love. While pass- 
 ing, I heard some noise in the building, but took 
 no notice of it. Lewis's jealous ear, however, de- 
 tected some taunt, which he regarded as an in- 
 sult to the ladies, and he recognized, the window 
 5 49 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 from wliich it came. He said nothing to any 
 one, not even to me, about it, but next morning 
 accused P of the insult, and instantly at- 
 tacked him. P was a powerful man, and 
 
 gave Lewis a pretty severe pommeling. 
 
 I was away at the time, like Demosthenes 
 practising my speech in solitude. When I came 
 back I found Lewis with his eye bandaged, and 
 bathing it with a cooling lotion; and then for 
 the first time learned the facts. I determined at 
 once that I too would fight. I was perfectly 
 sure that I would be badly beaten ; but no mat- 
 ter, it had to be done. I went to P 's room, 
 
 but he was absent. I waited for him in the 
 room of a friend just opposite, across the pas- 
 sage, but said nothing to the friend. When 
 P returned, I knocked at his door and en- 
 tered. As soon as I opened the door, he ad- 
 vanced rapidly toward me. I fully expected to 
 
 be knocked down; but to my surprise P 
 
 said that he was glad that I had come, for he 
 wished to apologize; that he had intended to 
 apologize to Lewis, but he had attacked him so 
 suddenly and violently that he had had no time. 
 He confessed that he was heartily ashamed of 
 himself. I was intensely relieved, although I 
 did not tell him so. On the contrary, I gave him 
 
 50 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 a piece of my mind, which to his credit he took 
 with great meekness. 
 
 The long winter vacations of two and a half 
 months we always spent on the plantation or 
 else at Cedar Hill, my brother's place. I en- 
 joyed these vacations immensely, renewing all 
 the sports of my boyhood, hunting, fishing, 
 boating, etc. It was in my last year at college, 
 immediately after returning from my last vaca- 
 tion, that I heard by letter of the death of my 
 brother William, on the twenty-fifth day of 
 January, 1841, just three weeks after I had left 
 him. This was the second great affliction I had 
 suffered by death. My brother was my guar- 
 dian, and a very noble man whom I loved dearly. 
 He had been in bad health for some months. 
 Liberty County was very malarious; and in 
 spite of the summer retreats, the planters suf- 
 fered more or less from fevers. The summer of 
 1840 had been more than usually sickly, and 
 when I came down in November, I found Wil- 
 liam in a very bad condition. He was well 
 aware of the uncertainty of his life, and often 
 talked to me calmly and even cheerfully of the 
 probability of his early death, for he was then 
 but twenty-eight. The only thing that dis- 
 tressed him, he said, was leaving his wife and 
 
 51 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 children. These talks deeply impressed me at 
 the time, but I could not fully realize their sig- 
 nificance, because he was cheerful and his 
 strength was still considerable. Only a few days 
 before I left for college he took a walk of three 
 miles with me without fatigue. The news of 
 his death came, therefore, as a terrible shock 
 from which I recovered but slowly. But youth, 
 absence from the scene of grief, diversion of 
 constant duties of study — under these condi- 
 tions sorrow can not last very long. But the 
 happy vacations at Cedar Hill, the home of my 
 brother, and with my sister in the old planta- 
 tion house! Should I ever know such things 
 again? 
 
 I have spoken all along of my scientific 
 tastes inherited from my father, and enforced 
 by his example, but have said nothing of the 
 development of the esthetic side of my nature. 
 As already said, my mother was passionately 
 fond of music. How much I inherited from her, 
 I know not; but from early childhood my de- 
 light in music was simply inconceivable. My 
 brother William, himself a flutist, observing 
 this, bought me a fife, on which I practised in- 
 cessantly; but lest it should annoy others, I 
 practised alone, and usually in the beloved gar- 
 
 52 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 den. In a year or two I became an excellent 
 performer. I remember well that a neighbor, 
 whose taste, however, was not cultivated, used 
 to say, that in his opinion, even in my best days 
 of flute-playing, I never made as good music as 
 I did in boyhood on the fife. After a few years 
 my brother bought me a flute, on which I played 
 much and quite skilfully all the time I was in 
 college and afterward, until I went to study 
 medicine in New York. 
 
 In New York I bought me a fine eight-keyed 
 flute, which I continued to use until I was nearly 
 fifty, when I quit playing altogether. Although 
 this is anticipating, I may say that my enjoy- 
 ment of my own flute music in early manhood 
 was intense, especially when playing entirely 
 alone. I never had, nor cared to have, the bril- 
 liant execution of some, but for sweetness of 
 tone and passionate depth of feeling, I think I 
 was seldom excelled. I kept up my music many, 
 very many years after my marriage, especially 
 as an accompaniment to my wife's piano and 
 songs, but gradually played less and less, until 
 finally I dropped it entirely, when I was about 
 forty-eight. There were several reasons for 
 this. My taste in music was going ever for- 
 ward, while my power of performance, for want 
 
 53 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 of time to practise, was going ever backward, 
 until they were so far separated that I could no 
 longer please myself, and dropped it in disgust. 
 In early life, moreover, my greatest passion was 
 for simple melody, of which the flute is an ad- 
 mirable expression; but as I grew older I more 
 and more enjoyed complex harmony, which, of 
 course, can not be rendered on the flute. I 
 enjoyed my wife's piano more than I did my 
 flute, and took more delight in listening than 
 in performing. 
 
 My love of poetry was far less advanced. 
 The first beginning of it was while in college, 
 and strange to say, showed itself in regard for 
 two poets as wide apart as possible — Milton 
 and Burns. My musical taste drew me toward 
 Milton, my love of nature toward Burns; but 
 my real fondness for literature and art came 
 much later, as I shall describe in the proper 
 place. 
 
 Lewis and I graduated in August, 1841. I 
 was eighteen and five months, and Lewis a little 
 more than two years older. It so happened that 
 my sister Anne, two years younger than I, grad- 
 uated from the Macon Female College, the first 
 female collegiate institution in the United 
 States, about the same time. It was arranged 
 
 54 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 (Anne's idea entirely) that we three should 
 make a tour through the Northern States, visit- 
 ing all the great cities. Anne joined us in 
 Athens, and we started at once. 
 
 This tour was a great event for all of 
 us. We went first to the national capital, 
 Washington, and put up at the best hotel. Anne 
 was determined to go in style. Now, Lewis and 
 I would, of course, have taken our meals at the 
 table d'hote like other plain people, but Anne 
 wouldn't hear to it. It was much grander to 
 have a private parlor, and take our meals there. 
 I think, also, that with woman's keener instinct, 
 she was sensitive about our exceeding green- 
 ness ; for after several weeks of travel, we gave 
 up this expensive habit. 
 
 To our inexperience, the Capitol, the presi- 
 dential mansion, the buildings of the several De- 
 partments, the Washington monument, not then 
 finished, etc., were wonders of architectural 
 magnificence. We attended, of course, the 
 meetings of Congress, and not only saw the 
 celebrated trio, Webster, Calhoun, and Clay, 
 but heard them speak. We also visited Mount 
 Vernon, the home of Washington. After a week 
 at the capital, we continued our journey, staying 
 a few days at Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, 
 
 55 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and Cambridge, visiting, of course, everything 
 that was most worth seeing; and returned to 
 New York to spend a month or more there. My 
 sister Jane, and her husband, Dr. Harden, and 
 their two children, were also on a visit to New 
 York. My brother John had graduated as Doc- 
 tor of Medicine, in April, and had just married 
 Eleanor Josephine Graham, the most beautiful 
 woman I have ever seen. He and his beautiful 
 bride were still in New York, waiting to go 
 South in November. Our whole family, there- 
 fore, except my brother William's widow and 
 her children, were here gathered in New York. 
 My uncle, John Eatton Le Conte, the distin- 
 guished naturalist, with his afterward still 
 more distinguished son, John Lawrence Le 
 Conte, then only sixteen, was living at that time 
 at 46 Walker Street, New York; and John and 
 his bride stayed with him, while the rest of us 
 boarded near by. All of us spent every evening 
 at " Uncle Jack's " house, and a very happy six 
 weeks we passed under these delightful condi- 
 tions. 
 
 Early in November we took regretful leave 
 of our dear old uncle and went South, and for 
 some weeks all of us stayed with my sister Jane 
 at the old plantation, Woodmanston. 
 
 56 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 About a week after our return my brother 
 William's widow came down from Macon, and 
 brought with her her brother, John T. Nisbet, a 
 young man of my own age. We became fast 
 friends and were soon inseparable. There were 
 at least a dozen houses in Liberty where I was 
 welcome to stay as long as I liked — the longer 
 the better — and " John T." always went with 
 me. We had grand times that winter, duck- 
 shooting, deer-hunting, riding on horseback with 
 the ladies, etc. 
 
 In the spring all of us went to Macon and 
 remained some weeks. In June John and his 
 wife, Lewis, and I went to Athens and organ- 
 ized a trip for the mountains. There were eight 
 in the party, four of us and four of the Nisbets, 
 and we filled two carriages. Our route was 
 from Athens to Gainesville, Nacooche Valley, 
 Yonah Mountain, Clarkesville, Tallulah Falls, 
 Toccoa Falls, and back to Athens. I had pre- 
 viously been over the ground during a college 
 vacation, but enjoyed it more in the gay com- 
 pany. But, as will be seen, I enjoyed it still 
 more in later excursions. 
 
 On our return to Athens the party broke up 
 and scattered, John going to New York with his 
 wife, Lewis to Cambridge to attend the Harvard 
 
 57 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 Law School, and I to Macon to begin the study 
 of medicine under Dr. Charles West. Here, 
 save for a few weeks at Columbus and Merri- 
 wether Springs in August, I remained until I 
 went down to the plantation for the winter in 
 November. 
 
 My brother John having settled at Savannah 
 and commenced the practise of medicine, I nom- 
 inally continued my studies under him. But 
 precious little study I did that winter! My 
 cousin John L. Le Conte, then eighteen, came 
 South and spent several months with me at the 
 old homestead. We had a delightful winter, 
 riding, boating, duck-shooting, etc. But John 
 never became really expert at any of these as 
 he had begun too late. 
 
 While John was with us, I think in April, 
 the great comet of 1843 appeared flaming in the 
 sky. With the single exception of that of 1858, 
 this was the largest comet I ever saw. The tail 
 was like the path of a great search-light, reach- 
 ing from the horizon to the zenith. As I was 
 always a lover of the starry dome, this wonder- 
 ful straight band flaming in the sky interested 
 me profoundly. 
 
 After John had left us, in June, I rode with 
 a companion to the Altamaha River and back, a 
 
 58 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 distance of thirty miles, to gather the plants and 
 river shells for which the region is so celebrated. 
 To escape the heat of the day and to have as 
 mnch time as possible at the gathering ground, 
 we started before sunrise. I can never forget 
 the delight of that early morning ride. The 
 cool, moist morning air was loaded with the 
 fragrance of the Magnolia glauca, which as we 
 neared a swamp could be smelt a mile away. 
 As we approached the Altamaha, the ponds were 
 covered with the broad leaves and the beautiful 
 yellow blossoms of the Nelumblum, which I had 
 never seen before. In addition to plants we 
 gathered a great number of river shells, espe- 
 cially of the Maio spinosus, with its needle-like 
 spines an inch and a half long, a shell that is 
 found nowhere else in the world. 
 
 During the winter my sister Anne became 
 engaged to Dr. J. P. Stevens, a very worthy and 
 cultivated man and a successful physician in 
 Liberty County. In June, 184-3, they were mar- 
 ried, and as Anne wanted to have a grand wed- 
 ding, on the shortest possible notice of four 
 days I went into Savannah and ordered every- 
 thing — cakes, fruits in abundance, about a ton 
 of ice — and got it all to Jonesville on the day of 
 the wedding. I had invited " John T." to come 
 
 59 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 down, and he also arrived the same day. I was 
 up all that night ; for after the wedding I went 
 out serenading all the girls of Jonesville and 
 the visitors at the wedding, and got back to my 
 bed at the family home in Jonesville just as the 
 sun was rising. 
 
 " John T." took me back with him to Macon, 
 and then over to Midway, to the home of his 
 elder brother, Mr. Alfred Nisbet. Here for the 
 first time I met a young girl of fifteen, Miss 
 Caroline Elizabeth Nisbet, who later became 
 my wife. Ah, the boundless hospitality of 
 those times! Alfred Nisbet and his wife and 
 family of five children, all nearly grown, lived 
 really bountifully on his salary of two thousand 
 dollars a year, and entertained five of us with no 
 thought of limiting our stay. We had a contin- 
 ual round of entertainments, musicales, and 
 evening parties, at which all the young people 
 of the village were present. The center of all 
 this gaiety was the bright-eyed, winsome Miss 
 Bessie. But I remained heart-whole. She was 
 only fifteen, and from the advanced age of 
 twenty I never thought of her except as a child. 
 
 Lewis returned from Harvard in June, and 
 immediately after married Miss Bessie's cousin, 
 Miss Harriet Nisbet, of Athens. My sister and 
 
 60 
 
COLLEGE LIFE 
 
 I went to Athens to attend the wedding and re- 
 mained for a week or so afterward at the hotel. 
 The landlord's daughter was a sweet-looking 
 girl with gentle, winning manners, and beauti- 
 ful blonde complexion. She played finely on 
 the harp, an instrument that, as she evidently 
 knew, was well adapted to show off the graceful 
 movements of her exquisitely molded arms and 
 soft little hands. Every evening I asked her to 
 play; and I must confess that those beautiful 
 arms and graceful fingers, those golden ringlets 
 and sapphire blue eyes did make some impres- 
 sion on my too susceptible heart — the very first 
 that I had ever felt. The evenings were becom- 
 ing dangerously delightful, when, fortunately 
 for me, it became necessary for me to leave, as I 
 had to begin my medical studies in New York. 
 I was sad and melancholy for a long time after- 
 ward; I went to Macon, but I did not get over 
 it ; I went down to Liberty for a few weeks but 
 still I did not get over it, though the girls made 
 much of me and kept me going all the time; I 
 went on to New York and stayed with good old 
 " Uncle Jack," and still it was some time before 
 I could feel wholly free again. 
 
 But ere long I was to learn that it was not 
 real love. 
 
 61 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MEDICAL STUDY IN NEW YORK," TRIP THROUGH 
 THE NORTHWEST 
 
 I spent the whole winter and the spring 
 until May attending lectures at the College of 
 Physicians and Surgeons, then on Crosby street, 
 New York. It was a constant grind, grind of 
 lectures, six lectures every day for six days in 
 the week. During the winter course of four 
 months the professors were Drs. Parker, Gil- 
 man, James M. Smith, Watts, Beck, and Torrey. 
 This was followed by a spring course of two 
 months by specialists, of whom I particularly 
 remember Dr. Alonzo Clark, who lectured on 
 pulmonary diseases. 
 
 I took advantage of every opportunity 
 offered, attending the hospitals on the occasions 
 of operations, joining the quiz class when there 
 was one, and taking a coach, Dr, Lewis Sayre, 
 then a very promising young surgeon. I also 
 took charity patients and thus had a little prac- 
 
 62 
 
MEDICAL STUDY IN NEW YORK 
 
 tise, under the advice, when necessary, of the 
 professors. Of course I took dissection, and 
 found it strangely fascinating, the very horror 
 of the thing adding greatly to the fascination. 
 
 Such was my work all winter and spring, a 
 regular cram; monotonous enough, but yet in- 
 teresting to me, especially the more scientific 
 part of the curriculum, such as physiology, 
 anatomy, pathology, and chemistry. As most 
 of the students were imperfectly educated, the 
 fact that I was a Bachelor of Arts was a fine 
 plume in my cap. 
 
 The summer of 1844 was an eventful one for 
 me, and I believe of great importance in my de- 
 velopment. About the middle of May, when 
 we were through with our spring courses, my 
 cousin, John Lawrence Le Conte, and I started 
 on a summer trip westward. We knew not and 
 cared little where we would fetch up, being in- 
 tent only on having a good time. If we had 
 known our course, we certainly would have car- 
 ried a very different kind of luggage, for we 
 were afterward greatly hampered by our trunks. 
 
 We went first to Niagara, stopping two days 
 at Syracuse in order to examine the salt-works 
 there. At Niagara we stayed a week, visiting 
 everything that was to be seen, and enjoyed it 
 
 63 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 immensely. " John L.," although at this time 
 only nineteen, was already an enthusiastic stu- 
 dent and collector of insects, especially beetles, 
 and had with him all the apparatus for collect- 
 ing, preserving, etc. He had inherited this taste 
 from his father, who had been all his life almost 
 equally distinguished in all departments of 
 zoology and botany. But recently he had spe- 
 cialized more and more on insects, especially 
 coleopters, and of these he had the finest col- 
 lection in the United States. John inherited 
 his father's versatility, but like his father, and 
 in much greater degree, specialized on coleop- 
 ters, and became, as is well known, the most dis- 
 tinguished coleopterist in the country. I was 
 myself a keen observer of nature, but not a spe- 
 cialist nor a collector in any department. I was 
 interested in John's pursuits, however, and col- 
 lected for him whenever I could without inter- 
 ference with what I regarded as higher pleas- 
 ures. For myself, I could think of nothing here 
 but Niagara, and could not help poking fun at 
 John for his greater delight in a new species 
 than in the grandeur of Niagara. 
 
 From Niagara we went to Buffalo, then a 
 small town, and onward to Detroit, which then 
 had a population of some eight thousand. 
 
 64 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 Here we stayed a week and saw a good deal of 
 pleasant society, through the good offices of 
 some ladies, whom we had met in New York, 
 and who, moreover, were distant relatives of 
 ours through a common ancestor, Eatton. 
 Among the pleasant acquaintances met here was 
 the Rev. Bishop McCoskey, a fine military look- 
 ing man, a fit soldier in the church militant, with 
 whom we dined several times, and who gave us 
 letters to the officers at Fort Mackinac. While 
 at Detroit, we visited Ann Arbor and the Uni- 
 versity of Michigan, then a very small affair. 
 The best thing they had was a rather fine col- 
 lection of minerals. 
 
 At Detroit, through representations made 
 us by friends, we took a sudden notion to go to 
 the Lake Superior country, and determined, if 
 possible, to go on northwest as far as we could. 
 We took, therefore, the regular steamer, which 
 passed through Lake Huron, the Straits of 
 Mackinac, and southward by Lake Michigan to 
 Chicago, then a thriving town of five thousand. 
 The steamer did not stop at Mackinac, but put 
 us ashore in a boat at 4 A. m., and went on, leav- 
 ing us shivering there. I shall never forget 
 that landing on a bleak sand beach, with not a 
 soul in sight. What are these strange-looking 
 6 ^ C5 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 canoes lying bottom upward on the beach 1 We 
 soon recognized them as birch-bark Indian 
 canoes. We had read of them and had seen 
 pictures of them, but had never before seen one. 
 While walking about them, admiring their grace- 
 ful forms, we tapped on one with our knuck- 
 les — such a discordant concert of remonstrant 
 voices, males growling, females shrieking, and 
 children piping, arose from beneath! We 
 precipitately retreated, each laughing at the 
 other for being so startled. Beneath each canoe 
 was a whole family of Indians sleeping ! After 
 a little we found some who were awake, and 
 guided us to the only lodging-house, a poor 
 miserable tumble-down shanty of rough boards. 
 The proprietor, a great fat, lazy, tumble-down 
 man himself, showed us to a really clean, tidy 
 room, and soon asked us to a breakfast fit for a 
 king : the most delicious broiled whitefish, steak, 
 and fragrant coffee. I learned afterward that 
 Lasly was celebrated far and near for his excel- 
 lent table. 
 
 After breakfast, we went up to the fort, and 
 delivered our letters. We were treated with 
 great courtesy by the officers, especially Captain 
 Scott and Dr. Holden. Captain Scott, the cele- 
 brated hunter of that time, was an interesting 
 
 66 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 man, with strong, alert, athletic figure, bright, 
 eager, keen gray eyes, and ruddy face, bronzed 
 by long exposure. He was a great discijjli- 
 narian, and the fort was clean and orderly in the 
 extreme. A famous hunter, his house was full 
 both of the implements and the spoils of the 
 chase. All kinds of weapons he showed us; 
 guns and pistols, swords and daggers, bows and 
 arrows, slings and crossbows, in the use of all 
 of which he was equally expert. Every " coign 
 of vantage " was adorned with elk-horns and 
 buffalo-heads and grinning jaws of panthers ; 
 before every door were rugs of bearskins and 
 buffalo-robes. I was intensely interested in the 
 story of his adventures, for I, too, had some 
 reputation as a Nimrod; but such big game 
 overwhelmed me. 
 
 Dr. Holden carried us all over the island, 
 and showed us all the remarkable sights, espe- 
 cially Arched Rock and Sugar Loaf Rock. 
 Arched Rock is like a fragment of a great wall, 
 forty feet high, which had been broken through, 
 forming a grand archway, like the Washington 
 Arch in New York. Sugar Loaf is a wonder- 
 ful conical peak, about seventy feet high, and 
 only twenty to thirty feet at the base. I was too 
 ignorant to understand the origin of these re- 
 
 67 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 markable features, and I have never seen any 
 explanation since; but upon reflection, I think 
 now they were probably remnants of an old 
 shore cliff, when the waters of the Great Lakes 
 were higher than now. I asked Lasly about 
 them : he lazily turned his quid of tobacco to the 
 other side, and remarked, " Yes, they say that 
 they're worth seeing, but for my part I'd rather 
 see a dog-fight." 
 
 I noticed, also, that the whole surface of the 
 island is so thickly covered with drift cobbles 
 that there is hardly soil enough to hold them to- 
 gether. This was the first time I was interested 
 in geological phenomena. 
 
 After four or five delightful days at Mack- 
 inac, we hired a canoe and two men to carry us 
 to Sault Ste. Marie, distant one hundred miles. 
 As we had to sleep out one night, we bought 
 blankets and buffalo-robes, the finest of which 
 at that time cost but a dollar. "We started at 
 10 a. m. and went sixty miles, camping on a little 
 island. The night was still and sultry, and the 
 mosquitoes bad; but about midnight it blew up 
 with some rain, and turned very cold. The men 
 wanted to get back to Mackinac next day, so we 
 got up at 3 a. m., cooked breakfast, and started. 
 The wind was blowing a gale directly in our 
 
 68 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 faces, and it was freezing cold. I never suf- 
 fered more from cold in my life; we drew our 
 blankets close around us, but the wind seemed 
 to pass through them as if they were gauze. 
 "We reached Sault Ste. Marie about 9 a. m., and 
 J ohn and I walked up to town with our blankets 
 wrapped about us, presenting a very stately 
 appearance, and exciting the admiration of sev- 
 eral Indian matrons, similarly dressed, minus 
 the coat and trousers. 
 
 We delivered our letters from Captain Scott 
 to Captain Johnson, and were cordially re- 
 ceived, messing with the officers and having a 
 jolly good time. We amused ourselves here 
 watching the skill and dexterity of the Indians 
 in running up and down the rapids in their 
 beautiful, but frail, canoes. Here we fell in with 
 Colonel Gratiot, who, with a lieutenant, Hemp- 
 stead, like himself from St. Louis, and ten ex- 
 pert Cornish copper miners, was on his way to 
 Keweenaw Point to develop the copper mines 
 there. We were invited to join the party, and 
 gladly accepted. The lands had only that sum- 
 mer been opened by the United States to miners, 
 and thus it came to pass that I was one of the 
 first party that commenced operations in these 
 now celebrated mines. 
 
 69 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 After staying two or three days at the Sault, 
 we took ship with Captain Stannard, and after 
 two days' sail, landed at Eagle Harbor, while 
 he went on to La Pointe. 
 
 Eagle Harbor is a beautiful landlocked bay, 
 on the north shore of Keweenaw Point, about 
 two miles long and half a mile wide. We 
 pitched our tent at the west end of the bay, 
 where there was a beautiful level sand beach, 
 and camped here about three weeks ; and a most 
 delightful three weeks we found it. We some- 
 times amused ourselves by rambling along the 
 shores of the Great Lake, collecting the most 
 beautiful agates ; sometimes by rowing on the 
 harbor in a little rowboat belonging to Gratiot ; 
 sometimes by shooting grouse and squirrels 
 with Hempstead's gun ; sometimes by swimming 
 in the clear, wine-colored waters of the little 
 stream. 
 
 John was in ecstasies over this place as a 
 collecting ground for insects. Every morning 
 the beach was black with insects cast up by the 
 waves over night. He gathered here in a few 
 weeks as many species as he could find in as 
 many years roaming over the country. Insects 
 essaying to fly over the lake were beaten down 
 by the winds, drowned, and washed up by the 
 
 70 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 waves here; or else insects crawling near the 
 water were carried away by waves and washed 
 up. The little stream which entered the har- 
 bor near our camp, moreover, brought floating 
 leaves and trash, and with them, insects to the 
 bay, and these also were cast up on the beach. 
 As might be supposed, the insects were mostly 
 ants and beetles. I often afterward used this 
 as an illustration of the manner in which strata 
 black with fossil insects are formed. 
 
 We lived bountifully while here, for the lake 
 teemed with the most delicious whitefish, and 
 the little river was full of trout. I had the best 
 opportunity of comparing these two delicacies. 
 After long hesitation, I gave the palm to the 
 whitefish. But it must be Lake Superior white- 
 fish. We varied our diet with an occasional 
 grouse, and frequent squirrels. 
 
 I stayed here, as said, three weeks. Of 
 course a settlement had to be made for the mi- 
 ners. Indeed, a town, or perhaps a city, had to 
 be founded. The party commenced building 
 log huts, and I took my ax and helped, thus 
 becoming one of the founders of the city of 
 Eagle Harbor. Just ten years after this — i. e., 
 in the summer of 1854, while I was professor 
 of geology in the University of Georgia — I re- 
 
 71 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ceived a letter from Eagle Harbor, asking the 
 exact date of our arrival and the date of the 
 completion of the first log cabin. As I had 
 kept a journal, I easily furnished the desired 
 information. What was the motive of the let- 
 ter, whether a decennial celebration or whether 
 a legal question of claim, I never knew. 
 
 The forests here were a dense growth of 
 tamarack, larch, birch, etc. In pushing through 
 this tangled mass, which in some places was 
 almost impossible, I would sometimes come on 
 a prostrate log of birch, two feet in diameter 
 and apparently perfectly sound; but when I 
 stepped on it, I would break through up to the 
 knee. The whole of the wood was gone, and 
 only the hollow bark left. I have many times 
 used this in illustration of the hollow sigillaria 
 trees of the coal, for in these, also, the bark was 
 the most imperishable part. 
 
 This kind of life was, of course, hard on 
 trousers. John's were becoming disreputa- 
 ble — they had to be patched. We had nothing 
 but strong bedticking; John covered his whole 
 seat with a patch nearly a foot square. It is 
 easy to imagine his picturesque appearance. 
 
 On the 3d of July, we regretfully left our 
 delightful camp and our friends in Eagle Har- 
 
 72 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 bor, and took ship again with Captain Stannard 
 on his next trip westward. The glorious 
 Fourth we spent on shipboard, and, therefore, 
 without the usual celebration. I got up early 
 on the fifth, and witnessed the most beautiful 
 mirage I ever saw. I was watching the forests 
 as we approached La Pointe, and made some 
 remark. " That is not the shore that you see," 
 said the captain ; " it is only the loom." As 
 we approached, the land and the trees on it 
 became more distinct, and their reflection in 
 the glassy surface of the lake came in view. 
 As we still approached, the whole appear- 
 ance rose higher and the real tree-tops ap- 
 peared interlocked, as it were, with the inverted 
 trees of the phantom. Gradually the phantom 
 rose higher and higher, till it disappeared, leav- 
 ing only the real. At one time in this gradual 
 transition there were four repetitions of the 
 forest, viz., the phantom forest and its reflec- 
 tion, and the real forest and its reflection. In 
 explanation, I suppose there was a cold dense 
 layer of air on the water, for the lake is very 
 cold, and the greater refraction of this layer 
 caused the phenomenon. I have often seen it 
 under similar conditions, but never before or 
 since so finely displayed. 
 
 73 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 At La Pointe we took rooms at the house 
 of Mr. Oakes, the Indian agent. There were 
 two or three hundred Indians on the island, 
 but only two white men; Mr. Oakes, who 
 had married a half-breed Indian woman, and 
 had two rather pretty quadroon daughters of 
 seventeen or eighteen; and Dr. Borup, the 
 American Fur Company's agent, a Norwegian, 
 and a really intelligent and cultivated gentle- 
 man. 
 
 We stayed several days at La Pointe in 
 order to make preparations for a long camping 
 trip, and one of these was Sunday. In the fore- 
 noon we went to the Christian service; in the 
 afternoon, to the pagan. I was interested in 
 both, but especially in the latter. I observed, 
 too, the same Indians attending with sober de- 
 voutness the one, and then with frenzied de- 
 light the other. Of this latter, which lasted 
 some three hours, I give a brief description, 
 though I never clearly understood what it was 
 all about. 
 
 The Indians had built a birch-bark lodge, 
 seventy to eighty feet long, and thirty or forty 
 feet wide. In the middle of this they had set 
 up a post, painted with red stripes. This 
 seemed to be a temporary representative of the 
 
 74 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 Great Spirit, Manitiongeh, for they always made 
 obeisance to it in passing. It is impossible 
 to describe the strange mixture of dancing, 
 chanting, drum-beating, and rattle-shaking. It 
 was apparently a ceremony of initiation of an 
 old woman into a religious society. She sat on 
 a number of blankets spread on the ground, 
 about half-way between the painted post and the 
 end of the lodge. The blankets were appar- 
 ently the initiatory offerings. The audience 
 sat about the walls all around. Five or six 
 priests, or medicine-men, with medicine pouches 
 in their hands, made of the skins of small ani- 
 mals, retaining the shape of the animal, and es- 
 pecially the head, marched continuously around 
 the post, the woman chanting. All that I could 
 distinguish were the words " Hay — Mani- 
 tiongeh — Hay " repeated almost indefinitely. 
 Every time the medicine-men passed around the 
 woman, they presented the heads of the animal- 
 bags toward her, with a " ho-ho-ho-ho," rapidly 
 pronounced. Whenever this was done, she 
 bowed her head toward the ground and trem- 
 bled violently. Her agitation increased with 
 every repetition, until finally she fell prostrate 
 on her face, and was taken out in an insensible 
 condition, and carried into a small separate 
 
 75 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 lodge. What occurred there was a religious 
 secret. As soon as she returned revived, there 
 commenced a general dance of the whole com- 
 pany, in which she joined with supernatural ac- 
 tivity. Gradually religious excitement passed 
 into frenzy, and frenzy into convulsions and in- 
 sensibility, and in this condition she was again 
 borne out. 
 
 We stayed at La Pointe several days making 
 the necessary arrangements for our long trip to 
 the head- waters of the Mississippi, and thence 
 to Fort Snelling. From there we expected to 
 go up the Minnesota Eiver, then called the St. 
 Peter's. We therefore hired from Dr. Borup a 
 large-sized birch-bark canoe and two men as 
 guides and paddlers for forty days, and paid 
 him at once. We had moccasins made, as it is 
 not safe to wear boots or shoes in a birch-bark 
 canoe, and laid in provisions — pork, flour, 
 cheese, maple-sugar, crackers, tea, coffee, etc. 
 
 When ready, we bade good-by to our 
 friends, not forgetting the pretty quadroons, 
 and walked down to the canoe. When my foot 
 went over the side of the canoe, as I had for- 
 gotten about the moccasins, my ankle was 
 seized — " No, no, not with shoes ; must put on 
 moccasins." The change was soon made, and 
 
 76 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 we embarked. "We wore nothing but these moc- 
 casins on our feet for three weeks. 
 
 I stop a moment to describe our canoe and 
 guides. Our canoe was an ordinary birch- 
 bark, now so familiar, but then new to me. 
 Their lightness and grace, their paper-like thin- 
 ness and frailty are well known. Ours was larger 
 than usual, being about twenty-four feet long 
 and three feet wide. Our guides were Robi- 
 deau, a French Canadian and a famous voyageur, 
 and Francois Salle, a half-breed French Indian. 
 They spoke only the barest smattering of Eng- 
 lish, and their French was but little better, be- 
 ing a mixed patois. We, on the other hand, 
 spoke almost no French, so that our communi- 
 cation was largely by signs, although we did 
 manage to understand a little of their patois, and 
 made them understand some of our bad French. 
 
 We started about 8 a. m., July 8th. I can 
 never forget the delight of that day's sail among 
 the exquisitely beautiful Apostle Islands. Often 
 we were completely surrounded by them and 
 seemed to be in the midst of a little lake, with 
 picturesque shores changing at every moment. 
 The islands consisted of level red sandstone, 
 with bold shores, crowned with heavy for- 
 ests. We made a glorious camp our first night 
 
 77 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGEAPHY 
 
 out, among these islands, and enjoyed our- 
 selves thoroughly. 
 
 Next morning we came out from among the 
 islands, and skirted the south shore of the lake. 
 Here the guides took us to see a great curiosity ; 
 the south shore of the lake is bordered by an 
 almost perpendicular cliff of red sandstone 
 fifty feet high, the heavy level beds of which have 
 been eaten into and undermined by the waves, 
 forming caves and arches, which tumble in from 
 time to time, causing recession of the shore. 
 At one place the waves had cut far under the 
 cliff, and the overhanging table was supported 
 by many gnarled columns of harder sandstone. 
 The guides took the canoe more than a hundred 
 yards under the sandstone table-rock, and we 
 looked out through hundreds of columns on to 
 the great lake. Above our heads there were 
 fifty feet of sandstone, crowned with prime- 
 val forest. Through these gloomy corridors, 
 among these great columns, and beneath these 
 hollow arches, the waves dashed with a sound 
 like thunder. It was wonderfully impressive of 
 the power of waves as an erosive agent. I was 
 even then convinced that all the Apostle Islands 
 are but remnants of the same level sandstone, 
 left by a similar process of erosion. These 
 
 78 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 phenomena have been described by others since 
 that time, but I believe my own observations 
 were the first, as also were the explanations 
 given in my journal. 
 
 "We nooned that day near the mouth of the 
 Bois Brule River. The guides pointed it out 
 to us as the way by which they would return 
 from Fort Snelling. I thought nothing of it 
 then ; but long afterward learned by the investi- 
 gations of the geologists of this region that this 
 was an old outlet of Lake Superior into the Mis- 
 sissippi, through the St. Croix. 
 
 In the afternoon we prevailed on our 
 guides to take us across to the north shore, 
 as we desired to see at least something of it 
 also. After a little hesitation, they struck out 
 with vigor, remarking that a sudden squall 
 would be dangerous. The distance was about 
 twenty-five miles ; we went across in about four 
 hours, and camped for the night on a beautiful 
 pebble beach. Our guides began immediately 
 to pitch our tent on a mass of pebbles, each one 
 about the size of a walnut. We remonstrated, 
 but they assured us that rounded pebbles make 
 an excellent bed, and such indeed we found it. 
 The smooth pebbles slide and roll over one 
 another, and adjust themselves perfectly to the 
 
 79 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 form. It was the best bed surface we had yet 
 found. Sand, on the contrary, though appar- 
 ently soft and yielding, as every camper knows 
 makes the worst possible bed. 
 
 Next morning we paddled along the north 
 shore of the lake, observing as we passed every- 
 thing worthy of note, and drew up our canoe for 
 nooning on a sand-spit stretching across the end 
 of the lake and separating it from an estuary at 
 the mouth of the St. Louis River, up which we 
 were to go. This narrow sand-spit runs from 
 the north shore for six or seven miles nearly to 
 the south shore, where there is the only open- 
 ing into the St. Louis. Just where we landed is 
 the site now of the city of Duluth. At that 
 time, and for many years afterward, there was 
 not a white settlement within a hundred miles. 
 "While nooning here, I took a delicious swim in 
 the warm waters of the estuary, right along the 
 present water-front of Duluth. 
 
 The glory of the voyage up the St. Louis 
 River that afternoon will live forever in my 
 memory. The day was warm and still, the river 
 was wide and devious, the water smooth as a 
 mirror, and the banks clothed in richest verdure. 
 The Indian villages were strung all along the 
 river at intervals. At every turn we would 
 
 80 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 come in view of a new cluster of lodges, and 
 would be greeted with the peculiar shrill, vib- 
 ratory halloo, characteristic of the Indian, made 
 by vibrating the hand over the mouth. Every 
 greeting would be answered by our men in a 
 similar manner, and I too with some practise 
 succeeded fairly well. "We camped that night 
 at Fond du Lac, an Indian village of two or 
 three hundred, about ten miles up the river, 
 where we found a single white man, a Mr. 
 Boilleau. 
 
 Next day we went to the Falls, the Dalles of 
 the St. Louis, where there is a portage of nine 
 miles. As this was a serious undertaking, we 
 had to commence it in the early morning, and 
 therefore camped here for the rest of the day. 
 What a glorious swim I took in the roaring cat- 
 aract that afternoon! Some twenty or thirty 
 Indians, men and boys, had come from Fond du 
 Lac to visit our camp. As I went down the 
 cataract with railroad speed, they watched me 
 with the greatest interest, cheering as I passed, 
 and screaming with delight when I came out vic- 
 torious. I bantered them to join me, but 
 neither entreaty nor jeering would induce them 
 to try. I went down repeatedly (walking up by 
 land each time), leaping and playing in the roar- 
 * 81 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ing torrent, laughing and screaming with de- 
 light. 
 
 Next day began the serious business of the 
 portage. I was greatly interested in the won- 
 derful capacity of those men as beasts of bur- 
 den; each had a leathern strap, about eighteen 
 feet long and an inch wide, except in the middle, 
 where it was three inches wide; this strap was 
 tied about each end of my trunk by Robideau, 
 and the trunk thrown over on the back, with the 
 broad strap on the forehead. This was prob- 
 ably at least seventy-five pounds ; on this a hun- 
 dred pounds of pork was put, and on this again 
 some twenty-five pounds of crackers, making 
 in all at least two hundred pounds. With this 
 he went off on a trot. Francois Salle did the 
 same with John's trunk, and one hundred 
 pounds of' flour and other things, to make up 
 two hundred pounds, and followed at the same 
 gait. "We knew we could not make more than 
 six or seven miles, so we remained in camp un- 
 til the afternoon. In about three-quarters of 
 an hour, the men came back, loaded themselves 
 again in the same manner, and went off; and 
 we saw them no more until late in the after- 
 noon. 
 
 About four o'clock we started for our next 
 82 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 camp. This was our first experience in walking 
 any considerable distance in moccasins. The 
 trail was very rough and stony, and we winced 
 and shrank at every step. We soon got used to 
 it, however, or the ground became smoother, 
 and we went along very well. About half-way 
 we met the men returning for their last load, the 
 canoe. 
 
 On the way we observed how the portage 
 was made. The whole distance was divided 
 into stages about a mile apart. The first load 
 was carried to the first stage and deposited, and 
 the men returned to camp for the second load; 
 this was carried two miles and deposited, then 
 they returned to stage No. 1, and carried the 
 load to No. 3, then back to No. 2, and carried 
 that load to No. 4, etc., until all except the 
 canoe had been deposited at the camp for the 
 night. 
 
 Then the men returned to our former camp, 
 took up the canoe, one at each end, and car- 
 ried it the seven miles to the new camp. It is 
 seen then that they went over the ground 
 five times, equaling thirty-five miles, and one- 
 half the time each was loaded with two hundred 
 pounds. It certainly was an extraordinary feat 
 of strength and endurance ; one that I do not be- 
 
 83 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 lieve any other animal of similar size could pos- 
 sibly accomplish. The peculiarity of man in 
 which he is superior to any other animal, is his 
 capacity for training. Moreover, I believe that 
 the white race is superior in this respect to any 
 other race; and still more, that even in white 
 men, good blood tells in this regard, as it does 
 in horses. The great difference in men consists 
 mainly in the capacity for improvement by 
 training: some improve greatly and indefi- 
 nitely; some hardly at all, and quickly reach 
 their limit. 
 
 Early next morning while we were eating 
 our breakfast, a party of Indians, men, women, 
 and children, passed our camp, making the same 
 portage; but as they had little baggage they 
 traveled fast, and we saw them no more. The 
 men were stark naked, except for a narrow 
 breech-cloth, that passed between the legs and 
 under a belt around the waist ; and carried noth- 
 ing except their bows and arrows. The women 
 were better clothed, indeed, but each was bowed 
 beneath a heavy load. One of them carried the 
 canoe on her head, bottom upward, like an im- 
 mense scoop-bonnet. Soon after the Indians 
 passed we left our camp, which was in the midst 
 of a dense forest, on the margin of a beautiful 
 
 84 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 streamlet ; and re-commenced our portage in the 
 same style as yesterday. We easily finished 
 the remaining three miles by noon, and em- 
 barked again. 
 
 We had been told at La Pointe that we 
 should find the mosquitoes very bad in some 
 parts of the country passed over, and had made 
 preparations accordingly. It was here that we 
 began to feel these torments. We had indeed 
 felt a few at Eagle Harbor, and at nearly all our 
 camps on Lake Superior ; but here they became 
 intolerable. On this day, for the first time since 
 we left Sault Ste. Marie, the sky was cloudy. 
 Not only had we now mosquitoes all day, but 
 also brulos. These are almost invisible black 
 gnats, somewhat like the sand-fleas of the South, 
 but still smaller and black ; and are called brulos 
 on account of the burning sensation produced by 
 their bites. Here, therefore, for the first time 
 we had to " take the veil." We had prepared 
 these at La Pointe. A mosquito bar sewed up 
 into a cylinder, was drawn around the hat crown, 
 over the shoulders and arms, and stuffed into 
 the bosom; while the hands were protected by 
 gloves. But we must eat; we were compelled, 
 therefore, to make a smudge fire, and to put our 
 heads in the smoke while eating. But the veils 
 
 85 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 did not protect us from the brulos : these little 
 pests would crawl up the sleeves, under the col- 
 lars, everywhere. 
 
 To protect ourselves from mosquitoes while 
 sleeping we took a sheet just big enough to fill 
 the tent when pinned about three feet from the 
 ground. Around this we had sewed mosquito 
 netting, so that when pinned in the tent it would 
 hang down all around as a curtain to the ground. 
 To hold this down securely an edging of double 
 sheeting was attached all around, and this was 
 filled with small bird-shot. As soon as the tent 
 was pitched, we made down the bed, then pinned 
 up the sheet so as to make a ceiling three feet 
 above the bed, and put the net curtain with its 
 shot-loaded border on the top of the sheet. By 
 this time the mosquitoes would be thick in the 
 tent. I then put a handful of gunpowder on a 
 piece of paper or bark in the middle of the bed, 
 and after setting the tent door wide open, 
 touched off the powder. The sulphurous smoke 
 killed or drove out all the mosquitoes ; we 
 quickly put down the net, and secured it well. 
 When ready to go to bed, after undressing, we 
 slipped under the netting with the greatest care. 
 In this way we slept in peace, the humming of 
 the mosquitoes only lulling us to deeper slum- 
 
 86 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 ber. Fortunately, the brulos do not fly about 
 after nightfall. 
 
 Here we took into our canoe two half-breed 
 French Indians, on condition that they worked 
 their passage; so we now had four paddlers. 
 As the water was smooth, except for two or 
 three bad rapids, which we passed over success- 
 fully, we progressed rapidly; the men singing 
 their boat-songs together, and keeping time with 
 their paddles. The music was rude, but really 
 inspiriting. 
 
 This day for the first time we passed over 
 rapids in our canoe. I was much interested in 
 the skill and care of the men in managing it, and 
 especially in the extreme care with which they 
 repaired the least scratch of its tender surface. 
 As soon as we made camp, they drew up the 
 canoe and pitched our tent. They then turned 
 the canoe bottom upward, and made the most 
 careful inspection of every part. The least 
 crack or bruise was plastered with tamarack 
 gum, and a hot iron passed over it. This was 
 done every night until we reached Fort Snelling. 
 In a similar way canoes are patched with birch 
 bark, the patch being sewn in with tamarack 
 roots and covered with gum ; but our canoe was 
 never broken. 
 
 87 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 One would suppose that rising by successive 
 rapids to higher and higher levels, we would 
 have reached drier country, but not so. The 
 country seems to be a level plateau, abounding 
 in shallow, rushy lakes. The rivers are very 
 sluggish, tortuous, and marshy. The mos- 
 quitoes became worse and worse. Finally, 
 when we turned off into a little savanna river, 
 even more tortuous and marshy than usual, we 
 were compelled to make a smudge fire in the bot- 
 tom of the canoe, on a little earth put there for 
 this purpose. Protected by the smoke, and also 
 by our veils and gloves, we got along very well; 
 but the men in the front of the canoe were so 
 covered with mosquitoes that it was impossible 
 to tell the color of their clothing or hats — all 
 was a uniform gray. About noon we reached 
 another portage. As this was but three or four 
 miles over the low sandy divide between the St. 
 Louis and Mississippi Rivers, it was easily made, 
 with the help of the two additional men, after 
 the noon meal. John and I walked leisurely 
 over while the men carried the canoe and bag- 
 gage. About five o'clock we took canoe again 
 on another savanna river and paddled thence 
 to Sandy Lake, where the two additional men 
 left us. 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 At the Indian agency here, where as usual 
 there was a considerable Indian settlement, 
 some twenty or thirty bark lodges, we found 
 two white men, the first, with a single exception, 
 that we had seen since leaving La Pointe nearly 
 two weeks before. They were the Indian 
 agent, who as usual had married an Indian and 
 had a swarm of half-breed children, and Mr. 
 Clarke, a Methodist missionary, an intelligent 
 and well-educated young man, whose society we 
 enjoyed very greatly. 
 
 Sandy Lake is a beautiful sheet of water ; ex- 
 tremely irregular in form and with well-wooded 
 shores, it is very picturesque. We stayed here 
 several days for the sake of rest for our men 
 and of clothes-washing and change of diet for 
 ourselves, for our camp fare was the worst I 
 ever saw. I have camped a great deal since and 
 always fared well, but on this first trip the fare 
 was hard indeed. Youth and high spirits can, 
 however, stand anything. All we had was 
 flour, messpork, hardtack, tea, coffee, and 
 maple-sugar. An iron pot was our only cooking 
 utensil; we had not even a pan for mixing 
 dough. The flour bag was opened at one end, 
 the flour hollowed at the top, and a little water 
 poured into the hollow and mixed until it had 
 
 89 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 taken up flour enough to make a dough. This 
 was then kneaded in the hand and made into 
 balls that were thrown into the pot with hunks 
 of pork and boiled. These tough, solid, indi- 
 gestible balls, the men called " bondins." I 
 tried them only once ; after that I took my por- 
 tion of the dough, mixed it and beat it, putting 
 in a little lard, pressed it into a long snakelike 
 form, wound it about a dry stick, and stuck it 
 before the fire, turning it when necessary. 
 When it was browned, I pulled out the stick and 
 devoured the hollow cylinder with relish. The 
 pork I sliced, and toasted with a forked stick. 
 At Sandy Lake we were able to vary our diet 
 somewhat, for here we found an abundance of 
 fish. 
 
 The day after our arrival we took a delight- 
 ful swim in the clear, warm water of the lake. 
 Mr. Clarke joined us, and brought with him a 
 bright, active, handsome Indian boy of fourteen 
 years. The boy and I were the only good swim- 
 mers, and we had great sport racing with one 
 another. I was by far the more rapid and ex- 
 pert swimmer, but he was the most expert diver 
 I ever saw. I would rush after him, and would 
 be just about to overtake and duck him, when 
 he would disappear, and a moment later through 
 
 90 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 the clear water I could see him about seven feet 
 below, swimming with great velocity, assisting 
 himself by his hands against the bottom. I could 
 not overtake him there, but as soon as he came 
 to the surface again for breath, I was after him, 
 and he would again disappear just as I was 
 about to grasp him. It was only after he was 
 well exhausted that I succeeded in capturing 
 him. I greatly enjoyed our stay here, and, of 
 course, we repeated the swim and the chase the 
 next day. 
 
 On the morning of the third day, we were off 
 again; and in half an hour, we rushed with a 
 hurrah into the swift current of the Mississippi. 
 Day after day, for more than a week, we sped 
 swiftly down the mighty stream, which, how- 
 ever, was not so very mighty where we first 
 struck it. There was but little variation in the 
 incidents from day to day, and still less in the 
 scenery: one continuous stretch of prairie, with 
 here and there a few trees bordering the river ; 
 the surface of the country dotted over with in- 
 numerable little lakes, invisible, however, to us 
 on the river. I mention very briefly two or 
 three incidents on the way. 
 
 Soon after entering the great river we 
 stopped for noon at an enormous Indian lodge, 
 
 91 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 seventy to eighty feet long and thirty feet wide, 
 the home of a very great chief, about sixty years 
 of age. In it he lived with his ten wives and, I 
 was told, seventy children. I did not count 
 them, but I do not think the estimate extrava- 
 gant. 
 
 As we passed down the river we frequently 
 met Indians in their canoes, and traded with 
 them, flour or pork for fish or venison. From 
 time to time, also, I shot ducks on the river with 
 a gun we had brought from La Pointe. They 
 were not very good, being rather fishy ; but any- 
 thing was better than the mess pork and " bon- 
 dins." At night we usually pitched our tent in 
 the vicinity of an Indian village, partly to im- 
 prove our fare by the addition of fish or venison, 
 and partly because the Indians always select for 
 their village sites high and dry places, healthy 
 and free from mosquitoes. 
 
 Once we stopped at noon at the cabin of a 
 white man, a tall, straight, fine-looking, some- 
 what grizzled pioneer, with a squaw wife and 
 half-breed children. He received us with 
 boundless hospitality, as well he might, for he 
 had not seen a white face for six months. For a 
 similar reason we were also glad to greet him. 
 This was the only white man we saw in our 
 
 92 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 whole route from Sand Lake to the Falls of St. 
 Anthony, a distance of four or five hundred 
 miles. 
 
 To relieve the tedium of the way, and also 
 for the sake of exercise, I often took an extra 
 paddle and worked my way, for I was a skilful 
 manager of a canoe, having learned this, as has 
 been said, in my boyhood on the old plantation. 
 We passed over several rapids on the way, and 
 in one case over a nearly perpendicular fall of 
 three or four feet, which the men called Petite 
 Chute, or Little Fall. On approaching this 
 they put out all their strength, I also assisting, 
 and the canoe was literally shot over the little 
 precipice, and fell lightly and gracefully on the 
 smooth water below. This is called " shooting 
 the falls." 
 
 As we continued day after day, the river in- 
 creased constantly in volume by the addition of 
 the waters of tributaries on each side. These 
 were named by the men as we passed, but we 
 paused not ; for we were impatient of the mon- 
 otony of the long passage. 
 
 We were now approaching the Falls of St. 
 Anthony, where the great river pitches over a 
 precipice a hundred feet high. About noon we 
 reached the top and stopped for lunch, drawing 
 
 93 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tip our canoe on the very spot where Minneapolis 
 was founded five years later. There was then 
 there a single log cabin, and one white man trad- 
 ing with the Indians. After nooning here we 
 made a portage of about half a mile around the 
 fall, and put in again below. While the men 
 were making the portage we enjoyed the view 
 of the fall, and examined the structure of the 
 rocks. As the gorge below the fall is narrow, 
 the current is very swift, and we went down 
 " a-kiting." I was intensely interested in 
 studying the structure of the gorge. The cliff 
 is about a hundred feet high, and consists of 
 soft, cream-colored sandstone, capped with a 
 layer of hard, dark-blue limestone. The sand- 
 stone was so soft that I could reach out 
 as we flew swiftly by and take out hand- 
 fuls with my fingers. I at once saw, or sus- 
 pected, the mode of origin of this gorge, by the 
 recession of the fall, for I already knew the his- 
 tory of the Niagara gorge. My conclusions 
 were completely confirmed by the existence in 
 this case, also, of an escarpment at the mouth of 
 the gorge eight miles below the fall, at Fort 
 Snelling. All this was duly recorded in my 
 journal, but never published, because I was then 
 too young to appreciate the importance of the 
 
 94 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 observations I had made, and, indeed, too little 
 acquainted with geological literature to know 
 that there was anything new in them. A few 
 years afterward others made the same observa- 
 tions, and gave the same explanation. 
 
 About three in the afternoon we turned into 
 the mouth of the St. Peter's, now called the Min- 
 nesota River, and landed at the little straggling 
 village of St. Peter's, containing then about one 
 hundred inhabitants, mostly Indians. The pres- 
 ent town of Mendota may be its development, as 
 it has a somewhat similar situation. Here we 
 had a serious altercation with our guides. They 
 said that their time was up, and they must go 
 back to La Pointe. We told them, to their great 
 surprise, that we had engaged them for forty 
 days, and paid the whole amount — viz., eighty 
 dollars. They declared that Dr. Borup had hired 
 them only for twenty-eight days, and that it 
 would take all the remainder — i. e., a week — to 
 get back. We told them that we intended to go up 
 the St. Peter's — Minnesota — River, and explore 
 the Sioux country. In answer they said that 
 not only had they fulfilled their contract, but 
 that the Sioux Indians were treacherous and 
 dangerous, and exploring that country would be 
 at the risk of their lives. When still urged, 
 
 95 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 they flatly refused to go. There was nothing to 
 be done except to bid them good-by. They left 
 the same afternoon, going down the Mississippi 
 to the mouth of the St. Croix, then up that river 
 and over the portage into the Bois Brule, and 
 thence into Lake Superior ; which, as already ex- 
 plained, is the most direct route to La Pointe. 
 In justice to Dr. Borup, I should state that after 
 returning to New York, I wrote to him, and that 
 the money, twenty-four dollars, was promptly 
 refunded. 
 
 Our camping-trip therefore ended here. We 
 sold out our tent and bedding, blankets and 
 buffalo-robes, and leaving our trunks at St. 
 Peter's under suitable charge, hired a boat to 
 take us over the river. Having climbed the 
 cliff, or escarpment, on which Fort Snelling is 
 built, we delivered our letters from Dr. Holden 
 to Dr. Turner, the surgeon of the fort. He re- 
 ceived us with great cordiality, and invited us 
 to stay at the fort until the steamer from below 
 should arrive. We were given comfortable 
 rooms in the parsonage, and invited to take our 
 meals with Dr. Turner's family. Our trunks were 
 sent for, and arrived in due time, and we were 
 soon pleasantly settled for a week. We put on 
 decent clothes, exchanged our moccasions for 
 
 96 
 
TEIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 walking shoes, and were ready for dinner. We 
 found Mrs. Turner a charming woman, and en- 
 joyed her society the more as we had seen noth- 
 ing but Indians and half-breeds since leaving 
 Mackinac. We greatly enjoyed the dinner, too, 
 for that very day the game-laws imposed by the 
 officers on themselves ended, and they had 
 brought in about a hundred prairie chickens. 
 Dr. Turner, a famous sportsman, was especially 
 successful, his pack being about thirty. 
 
 In our quarters, the parsonage, we found 
 also domiciled two very pleasant gentlemen, a 
 Mr. Stockbridge, a young Episcopalian clergy- 
 man, traveling, and temporarily acting as chap- 
 lain, and Mr. Placide, the distinguished actor, 
 whom I had seen on the stage in New York in 
 his favorite play, " London Assurance," then 
 the rage. With these gentlemen I had much 
 pleasant conversation, and with the former 
 many pleasant rambles in the vicinity. 
 
 The shooting of prairie-fowl still continued 
 almost daily, and our table was always well sup- 
 plied with delicious game. As from early boyhood 
 I had been passionately fond of hunting, I some- 
 times borrowed a gun and joined the shooting 
 excursions ; but my success was only indifferent. 
 
 The favorite walk with Mr. Stockbridge was 
 8 97 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 to Minnehaha Falls, at that time called " Little 
 River Falls," for it had not then been immortal- 
 ized by Longfellow. It is a beautiful fall of 
 a considerable stream, about seventy feet per- 
 pendicular; and as it is not more than two or 
 three miles from the fort, we often visited it. 
 
 Its origin is evident. The Mississippi 
 worked back from the escarpment about two 
 miles, then still back across the mouth of the 
 Minnehaha River, which then for the first time 
 fell into the gorge and began to work back also. 
 And while the greater river has worked back six 
 miles to Minneapolis, the smaller has receded two 
 or three miles to the present position of the falls. 
 Of course we have here also the same limestone 
 cap, underlain with the soft St. Peter sandstone. 
 
 To Lake Harriet was a favorite drive, and I 
 often went there with the ladies; but I walked 
 there but once, for it was about eight miles. It 
 is a circular lake, about a mile in diameter, with 
 clear, bright water and clean, pebbly beach, and 
 is surrounded with dense woods, that contrast 
 delightfully with the bare, yellow, endlessly 
 stretching prairie. 
 
 After we had spent a delightful week here, 
 the steamer arrived from below, and we took re- 
 gretful leave of our good friends. Soon after 
 
 98 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 leaving, we passed, I remember well, a little vil- 
 lage of about two hundred people, which I was 
 told was called St. Paul. That night we passed 
 through Lake Pepin, an enlargement of the 
 river. The banks here are bold, almost moun- 
 tainous, and the scenery beautiful ; and as it was 
 bright moonlight, I sat on the upper deck and 
 enjoyed the view. The boat stopped from time 
 to time, but we did not leave it until we got to 
 Galena. A little before we reached our destina- 
 tion, Nauvoo and the splendid Mormon temple 
 were pointed out. There was at that time in- 
 tense excitement on the subject of the Mor- 
 mons, for it was only a few weeks before this 
 that Joseph and Hyrum Smith had been shot in 
 jail by a mob; and not long after I passed, in 
 1846, the Mormons were driven out of Illinois, 
 and their temple burned. After some wander- 
 ings, they settled, as is well known, at Salt Lake. 
 At Galena we stopped nearly a week, to ex- 
 amine the lead-mines there, as we wished to 
 study the mode of occurrence of the ore, the 
 method of smelting, etc. "We even took boat 
 and visited mines at Dubuque, Iowa. To the 
 early interest thus excited, I attribute the fact 
 that this has been a favorite subject of investi- 
 gation with me. 
 
 99 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 From Galena we again took boat to St. 
 Louis. John had written to his father to send 
 him money here, but on inquiry found that it 
 had not arrived, and was in despair. He was 
 entirely out of funds and stranded. I had 
 not money enough for both. What should he 
 do? In this dilemma an old friend of his ad- 
 vanced the money, and after two days of awful 
 heat in St. Louis, we again took boat down the 
 river, thence up the Ohio to Pittsburg, and from 
 there by railroad back to New York. After an 
 absence of more than three months, we arrived 
 there in August ; and our famous trip was done. 
 
 Again I commenced the old grind, six hours 
 every day, six days a week. And the same 
 grind with Sayre in the evenings. There was, 
 however, in reality but little grind in Sayre's 
 office, for he was almost as much a boy as any 
 of us. We sometimes had a " high old time " 
 and made so much noise as to scandalize the 
 neighborhood. It was something like the office 
 of Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen of Pickwick fame. 
 It was not quite so jolly this year, however, as 
 last, when Sayre joined heartily in our sports. 
 But he had married in the meantime, and Mrs. 
 Sayre, a most charming and cultured woman, 
 was boarding in the same house. Out of re- 
 
 100 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 spect for his wife, whom he dearly loved, he now 
 restrained himself and ns, and our real work 
 of review of the lectures proceeded more suc- 
 cessfully than before. I again, of course, un- 
 dertook charity practise among the poor, and 
 attended the hospitals whenever I could, but 
 only to witness important operations. 
 
 The morning course of lectures extended 
 from 9 a. m. to 1 p. m. ; the afternoon lectures 
 from 4 to 6 p. m. ; our dinner was at 3, so from 1 
 to 3 was free. On first entering the college I 
 had joined a gymnasium, partly for the sake of 
 health, partly because I was fond of athletics, 
 and these two hours I spent in gymnastic exer- 
 cises of all kinds. On leaving the college on 
 Crosby Street, near Grand, I walked to the gym- 
 nasium on the corner of Chambers Street and 
 Broadway. As my object was only health, 
 strength, and activity, I took no lessons of any 
 kind; but paid merely for the use of the gym- 
 nasium, and practised on my own account. I 
 became the most active and expert man in the 
 gymnasium, some of my feats being worth men- 
 tioning. I could hold out at arm's length thirty- 
 six pounds; grasp a pole and hold myself out 
 horizontally ; brace my back against an upright, 
 take the rings well shortened up, and push out 
 
 101 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 eighty-four pounds on each side ; drawing in the 
 rings, I could rise with my hands to my hips 
 without jerk, even when twenty-eight pounds 
 were tied to my feet ; could " skin the cat " in 
 the rings, turning my shoulders in the sockets, 
 and could do the same backwards. I could 
 vault straight between my hands over a hori- 
 zontal bar as high as my head; jump up and 
 grasp a bar, hang dead, and throw myself feet 
 foremost clean over without touching ; tie a hun- 
 dred pounds to my feet and pull myself up till 
 my chin was above my fists, a feat that I later 
 accomplished with a hundred and twenty pounds 
 tied to my feet, making the total weight lifted 
 two hundred and fifty-five pounds. I could pull 
 myself up with one arm till my chin was above 
 my fist. This, the acme gymnastic feat, no one 
 else in the gymnasium could do from the dead 
 point. About a year after leaving the gymna- 
 sium, however, I could not only do it twice with 
 the right arm but once with the left. I also prac- 
 tised boxing and wrestling and became some- 
 what expert, though I took no lessons, as I could 
 spare neither the time nor the money. 
 
 During this winter I became well acquainted 
 with many scientific men, especially the ornithol- 
 ogists Giraud, Bell, Baird, and particularly Au- 
 
 102 
 
TRIP THROUGH THE NORTHWEST 
 
 dubon. Audubon lived about ten miles out of 
 town in a large house surrounded by grand and 
 beautiful trees, immediately on the Hudson. 
 I often rode out with my brother John to spend 
 the day with him and his wife, and enjoyed the 
 visits immensely. He was then about seventy and 
 one of the most imposing men I ever saw; tall, 
 erect, with eagle eye and nose, and abundant 
 snow-white hair brushed straight back from his 
 lofty brow. His wife was a tall and stately 
 dame, and they were indeed a grand-looking 
 couple. Their sons John and Victor were with 
 them, and often took us out on the river in their 
 boat. 
 
 I graduated in April, 1845, after writing a 
 creditable thesis, on which I was publicly exam- 
 ined. I was privately examined on the subjects 
 of the lecture courses and given my diploma. 
 This is the only one of my diplomas that I have 
 not now (1900) with me. About ten years ago 
 Dr. Dalton, the distinguished physiologist, then 
 president of the College of Physicians and Sur- 
 geons, wrote to me that he was making up a set 
 of diplomas, one from each class, and wished 
 mine as representative of the class of 1845. I 
 sent it to him, and it is at present deposited in 
 the archives of the College. 
 
 103 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 TRIPS TO THE GEOKGIA MOUNTAINS; MARRIAGE; 
 MEDICAL PRACTISE 
 
 Yes, I graduated as Doctor of Medicine in 
 1845; just fifty-five years ago I was invested 
 with the grave responsibilities of life and death. 
 I felt then, and see still more clearly now, how 
 utterly unfitted I was to assume the terrible 
 responsibilities of medical practise. At that 
 time the courses were shamefully incomplete. 
 This troubled me little at that time, however, 
 because I did not expect to practise. I was in- 
 dependent, and had studied medicine mainly as 
 the best preparation for science. 
 
 Immediately after graduation I bade good- 
 by to dear old Uncle Jack and " John L." and 
 went South. I visited a few days with my 
 brothers John and Lewis in Savannah, and took 
 formal possession of my property, which John 
 had been managing for me. I then went out to 
 Liberty County and stayed for some time at the 
 
 104 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 homes of different relatives. In those days 
 literally everybody was glad to see everybody 
 else and to have a visitor stay as long as pos- 
 sible, and no one had the least hesitation in 
 doing so. 
 
 My interest in ornithology continuing, on my 
 return from New York I made a collection of 
 birds, shooting, determining, labeling, and stuff- 
 ing all the species of birds in the South, except 
 some of the sea-birds. This collection I gave to 
 the Smithsonian Institution in 1857. 
 
 In the spring of 1845 I read with great inter- 
 est a book that had just been published, Ves- 
 tiges of the Natural History of Creation, and 
 fervently discussed it with my brother-in-law, 
 Dr. Harden. This was my first introduction to 
 the doctrine of evolution. 
 
 About July I went to the commencement 
 at Athens and there joined a party of ladies 
 and gentlemen — nine in all — on a trip to the 
 mountains and falls. We were gone about a 
 month, and, as is usual in such parties, Cupid 
 was busy. But my heart was untouched ; I had 
 not yet met my fate. 
 
 At Decatur, where the party broke up, I met 
 my old friend John T. Nisbet, and after a week 
 there tramping around the country and swim- 
 
 105 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ming daily in the mill-pond, we decided to go 
 to the mountains by ourselves with no women 
 to molest us or make afraid. We enjoyed it all 
 immensely, but especially our stay at Beal's at 
 Tallulah Falls, the most beautiful place in upper 
 Georgia. 
 
 Beal was a queer character; tall, straight, 
 athletic, pompous, and self -conceited ; unedu- 
 cated, but with many grand phrases, especially 
 Latin phrases, that he had picked up from tran- 
 sient visitors and used on all occasions. In giv- 
 ing an account of his coming to this place, he 
 was accustomed to say that he " went to work 
 without tools of any kind manibus pedihusque" 
 He always brought out his three little children 
 and introduced them to strangers in the most 
 grandiloquent and theatrical manner. " This," 
 he would say, " is Rollo ; this," pointing to 
 another, " is Tallulah ; and this, Magnolia." 
 Then sweeping his hand around he would add, 
 " Historical, geographical, and botanical." His 
 wife was a meek, uncomplaining woman, but 
 withal a most excellent cook and housewife. I 
 never sat down to a finer table — venison and 
 wild turkey deliriously roasted, and such rolls, 
 green corn and tomatoes, and apple pie ! Their 
 house was the roughest log hut imaginable, lit- 
 
 106 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 erally made with no tools but the ax. As their 
 patronage increased, it had been added to from 
 time to time, so that the whole presented a curi- 
 ous and really picturesque appearance. 
 
 While here we explored the Tallulah chasm 
 from end to end, doing all sorts of foolhardy 
 things, such as young men love. We crossed to 
 the other side, climbed down to the Witches' 
 Cave, supposed to be inaccessible, and came out 
 at the door, creeping on hands and knees along 
 a ledge eighteen inches wide with a sheer preci- 
 pice at the side of five hundred feet. Once 
 while exploring the chasm we were overtaken by 
 nightfall and climbed from the bottom up the 
 Devil's Pulpit in the dark, reaching Beal's, tired 
 and hungry, about ten at night. Beal declared 
 that he would not undertake the climb in broad 
 daylight. 
 
 Just above the principal fall, the Tempesta, 
 there is a pool about a hundred feet long and 
 fifty wide, into which the Hurricane Fall rushes 
 at a steep angle and out of which plunges the 
 Tempesta, a hundred feet perpendicular. It is 
 called Hawthorn's Pool, because a young Pres- 
 byterian minister of that name was drowned in 
 it, a fate that several others, though good swim- 
 mers, are said to have narrowly escaped. It had 
 
 107 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 therefore a bad name and every one was afraid 
 of it. The water swirls about in an ugly way, and 
 it was believed that there were whirling down- 
 currents that were dangerous. I was a splendid 
 swimmer, and after looking over the pool care- 
 fully, determined to try it. I swam all over it 
 with safety, feeling a little tugging at my feet in 
 places, but finding no danger for a good swim- 
 mer. Thereafter I enjoyed my swim every day, 
 for it was in September, too late in the season 
 for visitors. 
 
 At the end of the month we returned to De- 
 catur, thence to Macon, and thence, in Novem- 
 ber, to Liberty County. And here occurred an- 
 other, and perhaps the greatest, crisis of my 
 life. For here I met my destiny; I fell in 
 love! Ah, it makes my blood tingle even yet 
 at seventy-seven to think of that winter! I 
 had once before felt a little precordial agita- 
 tion, but compared with this it was nothing. 
 The effect, too, was entirely different : the other 
 was premature; it was "puppy-love"; it was 
 sentimental and make-believe in comparison; 
 it was weakening and melancholy, This, on 
 the contrary, was stimulating and joyous, in- 
 creasing the whole manhood, physical and spirit- 
 ual, strengthening every existing faculty and 
 
 108 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 developing many previously dormant. One 
 whole side of my nature, the esthetical and 
 philosophical, my love for art, poetry, and liter- 
 ature, had its birth at this time. It was liter- 
 ally a revolution. 
 
 As has been said, I came down to Liberty 
 in November. My cousin Lewis Jones having 
 just graduated as bachelor of arts at Athens, 
 had come down to his father's place ; and he con- 
 ceived the plan of making a tour on horseback 
 through Florida to study the geology and 
 natural history of that State, then little known. 
 I heartily entered into his plans and agreed to 
 accompany him. We prepared our outfit and 
 made all arrangements to start early in Janu- 
 ary. But late in December my sister Sarah 
 came down to Cedar Hill, her plantation, and 
 in the hospitable way characteristic of the 
 South, and particularly of the Low Countries, 
 brought with her her niece, Miss Bessie Nisbet, 
 her nephew Joe, Miss Bessie's brother, and her 
 cousin, Miss Mary Nisbet, to spend the winter. 
 About the first of January I met Miss Bessie at 
 Midway church, and her bright, charming face 
 and petite form, now fully developed, captivated 
 me at once. It was literally love at first sight, 
 so far as that is possible. My imagination was 
 
 109 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 taken captive and frequent association that win- 
 ter did the rest. I need not say that the Florida 
 trip was forgotten at once, for Lewis also found 
 Cedar Hill too attractive to leave. It was a 
 
 great opportunity lost, but 
 
 That winter was the most delightful I ever 
 spent. Joe Nisbet, Lewis, and I had most glori- 
 ous days of duck-shooting, turkey-hunting, and 
 deer-hunting, and still more glorious evenings 
 with the ladies. "We got up many horseback 
 rides for the girls, and an incident connected 
 with one I can never forget. I had borrowed 
 for Miss Bessie, Lewis Jones's pony " Tiger," 
 a perfectly gentle but high-spirited and sen- 
 sitive little animal. Ah! what a fairylike 
 picture it was, the beautiful maiden on the 
 beautiful pony! But she was timid, inexperi- 
 enced, and unsteady in the saddle; I watched 
 them uneasily. We were riding alone to meet 
 a lady and gentleman at a trysting-place a 
 couple of miles away. The pony was ambi- 
 tious ; the rider did not know how to check him ; 
 he began to go faster and faster. I had to do 
 the same to keep alongside; this again stimu- 
 lated Tiger to get ahead; soon we were in full 
 gallop, and Bessie, becoming alarmed, dropped 
 the bridle and took hold of the pommel. I saw 
 
 110 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 at once that we should have a runaway and a 
 catastrophe unless I could quiet Tiger. I could 
 have taken hold of the bit and checked him by 
 force, but I knew that with his spirit this would 
 have required a hard struggle. I could perhaps 
 have lifted her from her saddle to my own, but 
 I was not sufficiently sure of either my strength 
 or my horsemanship. I knew that the pony was 
 perfectly gentle, for I had ridden him a hun- 
 dred times. I therefore dropped back a little, 
 only a little, and called to him, " Whoa, Tiger, 
 whoa ! " and to the rider, " Pull the rein gently." 
 She did so, Tiger came down to a trot, then in a 
 few minutes to a walk, and all danger was over. 
 But the gallop had loosened, and then shaken 
 down, Bessie's long, abundant hair, and it fell 
 as a veil covering her whole person and almost 
 enveloping the little pony. The whole scene 
 lives as a picture in my memory : the beautiful, 
 bright, balmy morning, the woods of pine and 
 myrtle, overgrown with jessamine vines, the 
 fragrance of whose golden blossoms filled the 
 air; the fairylike beauty of the girl, with her 
 veil of disheveled hair. Such scenes, alas! do 
 not often occur in one's life, but they remain as 
 eternal possessions in the memory. 
 
 For a week it was a constant round of 
 111 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 gaiety, while the whole party of young people 
 visited at Woodmanston, the old plantation; 
 there were horseback rides and boat rides dur- 
 ing the day and piano playing, singing, fluting, 
 and impromptu cotillons and Virginia reels in 
 the evenings. Bessie was an excellent pianist, 
 and I watched with great delight her brilliant 
 touch, her hands apparently far too small to 
 reach an octave, yet full of vigor and nerve. 
 
 The party broke up in April, Bessie and 
 Joe going to visit an aunt in Savannah, and I 
 remaining in Liberty. But later in the same 
 month I visited my brothers in Savannah and 
 again saw her. Did I really love her? I was 
 not yet sure of the permanency of my feelings, 
 and she was evidently unconscious of them. 
 Certainly I was not at that time prepared to go 
 any further. She went back to Midway, and I 
 did not see her again for four months. 
 
 A deep and permanent change had certainly 
 taken place in my whole nature. Her image re- 
 mained with me continually as a pure and holy 
 presence. I felt, as it were, put on honor in all 
 my conduct and even in my thoughts. Any 
 wrong act or thought I felt as a dishonor to her 
 and a disgrace to me. From my own experi- 
 ence I know that there is nothing so elevating 
 
 112 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 and purifying to a young man as a pure love for 
 a pure maiden. 
 
 Meanwhile I had not the slightest reason to 
 believe that she even thought of me except as 
 an agreeable companion of a day. Whether I 
 should ever meet her again, I did not know. I 
 had not deliberately determined to court her, 
 but if it was to be, it should be in her father's 
 house. I was sure that no one in the least sus- 
 pected my feelings, and therefore no one but 
 myself had as yet been hurt. But in any case, 
 whether she ever became my wife or not, my 
 love was an eternal possession that could never 
 be taken away. 
 
 In June, as usual, I went to Macon. While 
 I was there, Joe Nisbet wrote inviting " John 
 T." and me to visit him. I joyfully accepted. 
 Several young ladies had been invited by Bessie, 
 and we again had a merry party. Here my feel- 
 ings were confirmed and deepened, but still no 
 one suspected, not even Bessie herself. 
 
 After a very happy fortnight we made up a 
 party for the falls and mountains. There were 
 seven of us: my sister Sarah, who was to ma- 
 tronize the party; Miss Bessie; three of her 
 girl friends; the Rev. Thomas Conrad Porter, 
 then a Presbyterian pastor in Macon, but later 
 113 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 the distinguished professor of botany in La- 
 fayette College, Easton, Pa.; and L* We went 
 by rail to Griffin, thence by stage to Decatur, 
 and from there to Stone Mountain. 
 
 Stone Mountain is a dome of pure, bare 
 granite, standing alone in a gently undulating 
 region, evidently a harder core left as a remnant 
 of universal erosion. It stands about a thou- 
 sand feet above the general level, a bare, almost 
 sheer precipice on the northern side, but gently 
 sloping on the southern. On the top has been 
 built an observation tower a hundred and eighty 
 feet high. 
 
 Of course we had to see a sunrise from the 
 mountain. We started on foot before day- 
 break, and were on the top of the tower before 
 sunrise. But alas for our view! The whole 
 landscape was enveloped in fog. We were 
 above it and looked down upon it as on a limit- 
 less ocean. Presently the fog, already antici- 
 pating defeat from the coming sun, began to 
 break away, and the landscape to appear in 
 spots like islands in the ocean. The islands con- 
 tinued to enlarge and unite until the whole coun- 
 try lay spread out at our feet, all the fresher 
 and greener for its fog-bath. Meanwhile the 
 last remnant of fog drifted right over us, car- 
 
 114 
 
TEIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 ried slowly westward by a very gentle wind. 
 The sun was just rising and cast the shadow of 
 the mountain, the tower, the railed area at the 
 top, and the seven figures on the slowly, slowly 
 retreating, snow-white fog-bank. Like a halo 
 of glory about our heads, see ! a splendid double 
 rainbow ! It was the most glorious sight I ever 
 witnessed. This was the first day of our tour ; 
 we all hailed it with delight as an omen of happi- 
 ness, I especially, for reasons easily imagined. 
 
 After having spent the greater part of the 
 day on the mountain enjoying the splendid view, 
 we returned to the hotel. The next day we 
 went to Gainesville, a neat, healthy little vil- 
 lage, with delightful, exhilarating air and a 
 beautiful, cold, carbonated spring about a mile 
 away, to which we walked every afternoon. 
 Here we stayed several days, for the hotel was 
 celebrated for its excellent cooking, delightful 
 walks abounded, the air was delicious, and we 
 were all happy. With a coach and four that I 
 procured from Athens we then continued on our 
 way to the Nacooche Valley and Yonah Moun- 
 tain. 
 
 Nacooche is a beautiful, fertile valley with 
 several mountains in the immediate vicinity, the 
 most conspicuous being the striking Yonah 
 
 115 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 Mountain. Near the hotel, on the valley level, 
 is a mound about seventy-five feet high, with a 
 flat polygonal top of about an acre. It is un- 
 doubtedly artificial, but is too large to be en- 
 tirely so. I supposed then, and still suppose, 
 that it is a natural hill, artificially increased in 
 height and modified in form; but am ignorant 
 as to its purpose. Some say that it was con- 
 structed by the Indian mound-builders; others 
 that it is a fortification built by De Soto. In 
 the vicinity I observed some evidences of placer- 
 mining for gold; but / was more interested in 
 love than gold. 
 
 After devoting a day to the ascent of Yonah 
 Mountain, which rises eighteen hundred feet 
 above the valley and some twenty-three hundred 
 above the sea-level, and enjoying the unrivaled 
 view of the valley and the mountains from its 
 summit, we went on to Clarkesville, and thence, 
 after a day or two, to Tallulah. 
 
 Here we enjoyed for a week or ten days the 
 most delightful part of our trip. As this was 
 my fifth visit, I acted as guide, and day after 
 day we rambled in the great gorge till we had 
 explored every nook and corner of it. We 
 visited all five of the falls, but our favorite 
 haunts were the Tempesta and the Oceana. 
 
 116 
 
Hurricane Pall, Tallulah Falls, Georgia. 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 It so happened that we spent Sunday here. 
 Sunday at Tallulah! To us it seemed that the 
 day was more than usually sacred. We had a 
 clergyman with us — why not have religious serv- 
 ices in the chasm at the falls! At the top of 
 the Oceana Falls was just the place, the granite 
 here breaking into regular joints and forming 
 steps in an amphitheater on which we sat with- 
 in sound of the roar of the falls and surrounded 
 by grand cliffs. Mr. Porter was a man of rare 
 culture and taste; the invocation, the hymns, 
 the prayer, and the sermon were all in wonder- 
 ful keeping with the scene, and the effect was 
 really powerful. There was some tittering 
 among the girls at first, but it was soon suc- 
 ceeded by a solemn silence. The ladies sang 
 and I accompanied them on the flute, while the 
 roaring falls made a deep bass that harmonized 
 with the thin clearness of the feminine voices 
 and the soft breathings of the flute. I remem- 
 ber well the text of the sermon ; it was the scene 
 of Elijah at Mount Horeb, when the Lord was 
 not in the storm, nor in the earthquake, nor yet 
 in the fire, but in the still small voice heard in 
 the heart of man. 
 
 Another time we all went down by moon- 
 light and sat on the " Devil's Pulpit," so called, 
 
 117 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 but really God's pulpit for those who have ears 
 to hear; and the ladies sang while I played on 
 the flute. The holy stillness sank deep into our 
 hearts. All enjoyed it, but I most of all, I 
 think. Mr. Porter stood on the Pulpit and re- 
 cited Coleridge's Hymn to Mont Blanc with 
 really thrilling effect. His feeling for litera- 
 ture, and especially for poetry, was certainly a 
 real culture to me. 
 
 Such experiences of course fed the flames of 
 love in me, but I was distressingly uncertain 
 whether Bessie's heart was touched. Whether 
 she had begun to suspect my love I could not 
 certainly tell, but I thought so, for she was shy 
 in my presence and even avoided me. Yet she 
 did not seem displeased. I determined to set- 
 tle matters as soon as I saw her under her own 
 roof. 
 
 We left Beal's with great reluctance. We 
 had made friends with everybody and every- 
 thing there; with the pompous, good-natured 
 Beal, with his gentle, patient wife, with Eollo, 
 Tallulah, and Magnolia, even with Beal's dogs 
 and Mrs. Beal's cats. We went directly to the 
 Toccoa Falls, but remained there only a few 
 hours. It is a beautiful fall of a hundred and 
 eighty feet of a considerable stream, but lacks 
 
 118 
 
TRIPS TO THE GEORGIA MOUNTAINS 
 
 the grand scenery characteristic of Tallulah. 
 Still our luncheon place, a deep dell at the 
 foot of the fall, thickly overgrown with moss 
 and ferns, wet with eternal spray, was delight- 
 ful and refreshing. 
 
 From Clarkesville, which we reached in the 
 afternoon, we went on next day to Athens, 
 where we remained several days visiting my 
 brother John, who had become professor of 
 physics and chemistry in Franklin College. 
 Thence we went onward by rail and stage to 
 Midway, arriving there about the middle of 
 September. 
 
 The fateful day came at last. It was Sun- 
 day, the twentieth of September. A cousin 
 whom I asked to help me was astounded, hav- 
 ing never dreamt of such a thing, but arranged 
 that I could walk to church with Bessie that eve- 
 ning and gave her a hint of what was coming 
 after the service. I was by no means certain 
 of the result, and need not say how anxious I 
 was, or how I blundered, saying the things I 
 ought not to have said and leaving unsaid the 
 things I ought to have said. I shall not attempt 
 any account of what took place. Suffice it to 
 say that her acceptance was conditioned on her 
 father's will. This was all I could expect; it 
 
 119 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 assured me of her consent — what could I desire 
 more? 
 
 We became engaged and agreed to marry in 
 January, and after a month in Midway I went 
 down to the old homestead to remain until that 
 time. Heretofore in all my visits to Liberty I 
 had devoted much time and energy to hunting, 
 but this time I could think of nothing but the 
 coming January. Early in the month I went 
 to Macon and there impatiently awaited the ap- 
 pointed time, writing to Bessie every day. We 
 were married at eight o'clock in the evening of 
 January 14, 1846, by the Rev. John Baker. As 
 is usual on such occasions, the groom was un- 
 easy, awkward, nervous, with a painful sense 
 of being unnecessary, the bride, calm, quiet, and 
 dignified, as if conscious of her importance. 
 But enough — all I need to say is that my hopes 
 of happiness have been much more than real- 
 ized. Our love has grown stronger and more 
 tender to the present time, after a married life 
 of fifty-four years. 
 
 I have referred to love and marriage as the 
 second great crisis in my life. These two; but 
 there may be love without marriage, and, alas, 
 marriage without love. Love and marriage are 
 necessary supplements of each other, and must 
 
 120 
 
MARRIAGE 
 
 be combined to produce the highest spiritual 
 growth. Love, romantic love, inflames the im- 
 agination and esthetic sense, and kindles the 
 sense of beauty in the human person, in art, and 
 in literature. But this is not enough ; marriage 
 is necessary to bring about another kind of love : 
 that of the heart and affections, unselfish, self- 
 effacing, wedded love. The first grows up 
 quickly, but as quickly sheds its flower, unless 
 supplemented by wedded love, which continues 
 and grows to the end of life, not destroying 
 but only chastening the extravagances of the 
 former. The one may be likened to the Greek 
 spirit, with its intense love of beauty and in- 
 tense enjoyment of life, physical and temporal, 
 but adding the apotheosis of woman, which it de- 
 rives from the Teuton; the other, to the Chris- 
 tian spirit of self-sacrifice, with the addition 
 also of the apotheosis of woman in the form of 
 virgin-worship. The one ideal must not dis- 
 place the other either in the individual or in 
 society; the two, the Greek and the Christian, 
 must be united. They are united in every true 
 marriage; they are becoming so in every en- 
 lightened modern society. 
 
 A few days after our wedding we went to 
 Macon and thence to the old homestead in Lib- 
 
 121 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 erty, where we stayed during the winter. I 
 have since thought that I should then, while still 
 " foot-loose," have taken my wife to Europe. 
 I did indeed offer to do so, but we were too 
 happy in each other to care for much else and 
 at that time did not appreciate the importance 
 of foreign travel. The first year was spent, 
 therefore, in simple enjoyment of life and mu- 
 tual love. In the latter part of spring we 
 visited Midway and Macon, and then went for 
 the summer to Indian Springs, Rowland 
 Springs, and Major Freeman's, a large farm- 
 house in the fertile limestone region of north- 
 west Georgia. Here there was a very choice 
 company, and we spent several months in the 
 delightful place, riding, hunting, swimming, etc. 
 
 In October I took my wife back to her home 
 and her mother's care, and on the tenth of De- 
 cember, 1847, our first child, a daughter, was 
 born. Oh, the joy and yet the strangeness of 
 fatherhood! the softness, the tenderness, the 
 helpless beauty of new motherhood ! These are 
 too sacred to touch on further. 
 
 Three weeks later I went again to Liberty to 
 become the administrator of my brother Wil- 
 liam's estate for his widow and minor children, 
 a position that I continued to hold until the 
 
 122 
 
MARRIAGE 
 
 children were grown and married. On the way 
 I stayed one night in Savannah with Lewis, who 
 was just recovering from the measles. I had 
 never had the disease, hut as I had frequently 
 visited measled patients in New York without 
 ill effect, I considered myself immune, and went 
 in and conversed with Lewis half an hour. But 
 the measles got me this time! In Macon on 
 the day before the one that I had fixed for my 
 return to Midway I was taken with a high fever, 
 and for ten days afterward could not leave my 
 bed. It was an awful disappointment to be 
 separated from my wife and child, whom I 
 longed intensely to see, and in my impatience 
 I got up much too early. The attack was a se- 
 vere one and left me in bad condition, with slow 
 fevers and a ravenous appetite, but without the 
 power of assimilating my food. My hair fell 
 off, and this was the beginning of my baldness. 
 It was several years before I regained my for- 
 mer vigor, if indeed I ever did. 
 
 Since my graduation in 1841, with the ex- 
 ception of the two years spent in New York in 
 medical study, I had simply drifted about and 
 enjoyed life, as I thought, in a noble way. My 
 ideal was culture, physical, mental, and moral, 
 simply for the sake of culture. This is a high 
 
 123 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ideal, but not the highest. If one can afford it, 
 as I could, and the life is not continued too long, 
 it is well. It has a wonderfully rounding and 
 broadening effect, and I do not regret the six 
 years so spent. In connection with this matter 
 I call to mind the contrast between the two 
 friends Meister and Werner, in Goethe's Wil- 
 helm Meister's Apprenticeship. The roving 
 good-for-naught and the industrious merchant 
 meet after a separation of two years ; and in the 
 description of the broad brow, clear eye, and 
 free step of the one as contrasted with the nar- 
 row, careworn face and stooping shoulders of 
 the other, there is a real touch of nature. 
 
 Such a life, then, is all well enough for a few 
 years, but I had had as much of it as was good 
 for me. When a man has a wife and child his 
 view of life changes ; he must become a worker 
 in the social hive. I could not live on my plan- 
 tation, as my father did and as I had at one time 
 intended to do, for this would have been at the 
 sacrifice of the pleasures of life for my wife, of 
 ambition for myself, and of health for our chil- 
 dren. I had to practise my profession. 
 
 I decided to settle in Macon, rented a house 
 and an office, and began the practise of medi- 
 cine. I lived there two years and a half, until 
 
 124 
 
MEDICAL PRACTISE 
 
 July, 1850. In 1849 I built a house and for the 
 first time owned my own home. For a year, 
 while I was clearing off the debt incurred by 
 building, we lived on very little, some six or 
 seven hundred dollars — excellent discipline for 
 us who had always had what we wanted. 
 
 In 1849 the Macon Medical Society was 
 founded, and before it I read the first paper I 
 ever wrote, one entitled The Science of Medi- 
 cine. It was published in the Southern Medi- 
 cal and Surgical Journal for August, 1849. In 
 this same year also I assisted in the organiza- 
 tion of the Georgia State Medical Society, 
 whose first meeting was held in Macon. In 
 1899 the golden anniversary of this society 
 took place and I was made an honorary mem- 
 ber. 
 
 In practise I met with moderate success but 
 the teaching of two or three medical students 
 interested me far more than practise. The fact 
 is that my tastes were far more scientific than 
 practical, and perhaps more than most persons 
 would have I felt my want of adequate prepara- 
 tion for undertaking the awful responsibilities 
 of a medical practitioner. Evidently I had not 
 found my right place ; I was not working in the 
 line of my best powers, and suffered greatly 
 
 125 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 from a sense of having wasted my life. It was 
 the only time that I was really unhappy ; and I 
 know of no unhappiness equal to this sense of a 
 wasted life. No one knew my feeling, least of 
 all my wife; I acknowledged it to myself only 
 during long solitary walks in the woods. 
 
 Finally, in the spring of 1850, my cousin 
 Lewis Jones, who had come to Macon to attend 
 the meeting of the State Medical Society and 
 stayed at my house, told me his purpose of be- 
 coming a pupil of Agassiz, who had been made 
 professor of geology and zoology in Harvard. 
 I heartily joined in his plan, our object being 
 special preparation for the teaching of these 
 subjects. 
 
 About this time Dr. Nottingham, an old and 
 distinguished physician who had just settled in 
 Macon, made me an offer of partnership. It 
 was undoubtedly a tempting one; I had large 
 family connections and he had large experi- 
 ence; we should certainly have been success- 
 ful. It was now or never, if I was to make 
 medicine my life-work. I decided not to accept. 
 I had found my vocation. I broke up, sold out, 
 left Macon, and went to Cambridge in August, 
 1850. 
 
 126 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 I was very sorry to leave Macon. Mainly 
 through my wife, I had a large circle of friends 
 who were the most influential people in the city. 
 My most intimate friend was my wife's uncle, 
 Eugenius A. Nisbet, Eepresentative in Congress 
 and judge of the Supreme Court of Georgia. 
 With him I often took long walks, sometimes 
 spending whole days pretending to fish but 
 really reading Izaak Walton and discussing all 
 sorts of literary and philosophic topics. I also 
 took long walks with Dr. James Green, study- 
 ing the plants in the region about the city. I 
 continued, moreover, to increase my collection of 
 birds. It was at this time that I fell in with the 
 works of Richard Owen, the great comparative 
 anatomist, and it was perhaps his The Arche- 
 type and Homologies of the Vertebrate System 
 which interested me intensely, that more than 
 anything else decided me to become a pupil of 
 Agassiz. 
 
 127 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 On the way to Cambridge I attended the 
 meeting of the American Association for the 
 Advancement of Science, in New Haven, and 
 became a member. I then became acquainted 
 with many scientific men who became my life- 
 long friends, among them Agassiz, Guyot, Dana, 
 Hall, Peirce, Bache, Henry, and William B. and 
 Henry D. Rogers, every one of whom is now 
 dead. 
 
 I arrived in Cambridge in August. The 
 college did not open until October, but that did 
 not matter to me, as I went to Harvard simply 
 to study with Agassiz. He was in Cambridge, 
 and Dr. Jones and I went right to work. The 
 first task Agassiz set us was very characteristic 
 of the man. He thought a while, then pulled out 
 a drawer containing from five hundred to a 
 thousand separated valves of Unios, of from 
 fifty to a hundred different species, all mixed 
 together, and said, " Pair these valves and 
 classify into species ; names no matter ; separate 
 the species." Pie left us alone, very severely 
 alone. We worked on those shells for one 
 whole week, the professor looking at our work 
 from time to time but making no remark. 
 Finally we told him that we had done the best 
 we could ; he examined the results carefully and 
 
 128 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 was much pleased. It so happened that just 
 then there entered the room a friend of his 
 from Europe, Ampere, the son of the great elec- 
 trician. He introduced us and remarked that 
 these pupils of his had just amended correctly 
 the classification of Lea, the great authority on 
 Unios. 
 
 I give this only as an example of his method 
 of teaching. He consistently carried it out, 
 with some modifications. He set us tasks, and 
 we worked unaided save for a hint here and 
 there. As we became better acquainted, how- 
 ever, finding us already well advanced in 
 thoughtfulness, he often gave us long talks, ex- 
 pounding his biological philosophy and inviting 
 discussions, which we were not slow to accept. 
 He thus scattered unpublished thoughts and 
 suggestions broadcast on all sides with a free 
 hand. 
 
 There are two types of great men: those of 
 one class are great by the quantity and impor- 
 tance of their work, but when one comes in con- 
 tact with them and measures them intellectually, 
 they seem of ordinary stature — their work is 
 greater than themselves, though surely patience 
 and persistence are admirable qualities that 
 should be added to their work in estimating 
 10 129 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 their greatness; those of the other class, the 
 nearer they are approached the greater they 
 grow — they are themselves greater than all their 
 visible results. These are the great teachers; 
 their spirit and enthusiasm are contagious; 
 their personality is magnetic. They not only 
 think intensely, but they are the cause of 
 thought in others. Agassiz was preeminently 
 of this latter class. To explain how much I 
 owe to him, it is only necessary to say that for 
 fifteen months I was associated with him in the 
 most intimate personal way, from eight to ten 
 hours a day, and every day, usually including 
 Sundays. I was his companion in all of his ex- 
 cursions ; geological, with Hall in the fossilifer- 
 ous fields of New York, and zoological along the 
 shores of Massachusetts and on the reefs of 
 Florida. 
 
 This last excursion was so important as to 
 justify dwelling upon it. The Straits of 
 Florida are probably the most dangerous to 
 navigation in the world, owing mainly to the 
 coral reefs of that region. Professor Bache, 
 of the United States Coast Survey, asked Agas- 
 siz to investigate the laws of growth of these 
 reefs. His expenses and those of his assist- 
 ants were to be paid, and he offered to take us 
 
 130 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 and his son Alexander, then sixteen, as his as- 
 sistants. Here was a grand opportunity ! But 
 my second daughter, Sallie, " the little Yankee," 
 as we playfully call her, had been born in No- 
 vember in the house in which we were living on 
 the Harvard campus, and I questioned whether I 
 could leave my wife and children. Oh, the pain, 
 the distress, the pity of it ! My wife urged me 
 not to let slip such an opportunity, however, and 
 I accepted. We started on her birthday, the 
 first of January. 
 
 While in Charleston awaiting the departure 
 of the steamer for Key West, I had a long talk 
 with a Cambridge friend on the subject of slav- 
 ery. He was greatly impressed by what I said 
 but not convinced. I left him with the remark, 
 " You stay in the South this winter ; I will see 
 you again next spring in Cambridge; tell me 
 then what you think." I did see him again in 
 Cambridge in June, and he then retracted all 
 his previous objections and agreed with me en- 
 tirely. I might give the details of my argu- 
 ments, but they are substantially embodied and 
 brought up to date in my article on The Eace 
 Problem in the South, in the volume Man and 
 the State, published in 1892 by the Ethical As- 
 sociation of Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 131 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 I can not dwell — as I would like to — on the 
 voyage to Key West. I enjoyed it all intensely ; 
 the weather so soft and balmy ; the sea so calm 
 and smooth, the water of the Gulf Stream rival- 
 ing the sky in blueness; the sharks in multi- 
 tudes following the boat behind and piloting it 
 in front, plainly seen in the clear water, now 
 darting ahead and now falling back to their 
 previous positions ; the flying-fish, rising in 
 swarms, their vibrating fins glittering in the 
 sun, then, after a flight of a hundred yards 
 or so, falling back in showers; the purple and 
 blue Physalias with their long tentacles float- 
 ing so gracefully; the coral-trees and coral- 
 heads plainly visible as we steamed rapidly by 
 close to the reef — I never in my life was so 
 delighted. 
 
 Five or six days after leaving Cambridge 
 we reached Key "West. We had left in a snow- 
 storm, everything being locked in ice and cov- 
 ered with snow; here we swam in the ocean 
 every day and slept without covering and with 
 the windows wide open ; the change was delight- 
 ful. I remember well being awakened the first 
 morning by a clattering sound. I thought it 
 was the delicious pattering of rain on the roof. 
 But no, the sun was shining brightly ; it was the 
 
 132 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 noise of the breeze in the cocoanut leaves. The 
 impression was exquisitely tropical. 
 
 We were incessantly at work; sometimes 
 visiting the reefs in a Government steamer; 
 sometimes exploring the Everglades in one di- 
 rection, sometimes the Tortugas in the other; 
 but always observing, noting, and gathering 
 specimens. The collections were enormous, for 
 the whole population, especially the sailors, 
 three or four hundred in number, collected for 
 Agassiz. The keen delight, the almost childish 
 glee of Agassiz when anything new was brought 
 to him pleased these children of nature im- 
 mensely. " One touch of nature makes the 
 whole world kin." Sometimes for several days 
 in succession we would be out all day 
 on the reefs collecting, generally waist-deep in 
 the water; then for several days in our work- 
 room on the wharf at Key West we would study 
 our specimens with microscopes, draw, and pack 
 away. In the evenings we would gather in 
 Agassiz' room, and discuss the day's work and 
 the conclusions to be drawn therefrom. I never 
 saw any one work like Agassiz; for fourteen 
 hours a day he would work under high pressure, 
 smoking furiously all the time. The harder he 
 worked, the faster he consumed cigars. 
 
 133 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 
 
 The longest of our excursions from Key 
 West was on the Coast Survey steamer, of which 
 John Rodgers, afterward admiral and Super- 
 intendent of the Naval Observatory at Wash- 
 ington, was captain. Very intelligent and a 
 keen observer of nature, he was of the greatest 
 service to us in many ways, especially by sug- 
 gesting points for investigations. We steamed 
 close along the reef, stopping from time to time 
 and taking a rowboat for closer observations, 
 and often getting out and wading waist-deep on 
 the reef, climbing among the coral-trees and 
 over the coral-heads. We especially and care- 
 fully examined the structure of the little islands 
 just commencing to form on the reef and not 
 yet inhabited, particularly of Sand Key, which 
 had been cut into to lay the foundations of a 
 lighthouse. Next we examined the structure 
 of the larger islands or true keys ; and then that 
 of the mangrove islands, which we found to be 
 of entirely different character and origin. 
 After examining the limestone ridge that forms 
 the southern coast of Florida, we went by boat 
 up the Miami River, which cuts through the 
 higher rim and drains the Everglades, to study 
 the structure of the Everglades and that of their 
 hummocks. Thence we returned, visiting sev- 
 
 134 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 eral other keys on the way back to Key West. 
 There we examined the collection we had gath- 
 ered, made all necessary drawings, and packed 
 selected specimens in alcohol. 
 
 Another important expedition was made by 
 sailing vessel, Captain Frye, to the Marquesas 
 Islands, and thence into the Dry Tortugas. 
 Here was stationed a company of marines, and 
 we were of course entertained at the fort. The 
 day after our arrival Agassiz sent Dr. Jones and 
 me on the ship to examine a little island about 
 ten miles away, while he and Alexander re- 
 mained at the fort. We soon examined the 
 island, but were becalmed and lay there an- 
 chored all the next day with not a breath of 
 wind. The water was about twenty feet deep 
 and so clear that the waving of sea-fans and 
 switch corals (Gorgonias) and the gorgeously 
 colored fish swimming among their branches 
 were almost as distinct as if there had been no 
 water at all. What a beautiful place for a dive ! 
 No sooner said than done. I stripped, plunged 
 head foremost from the deck, and easily reached 
 the bottom, from which I tore Gorgonias and 
 sponges that on rising I handed to the sailors. 
 While I was thus amusing myself, an old-style 
 naturalist who had joined our party for this ex- 
 
 135 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 cursion, much to the disgust of Agassiz as I 
 thought, came paddling around the ship in a lit- 
 tle boat. He was a poky old fellow, and was 
 slowly paddling and peering over the gunwale 
 in an aimless way. I gave the wink to the sail- 
 ors, who were looking on, took hold of the keel 
 of the boat behind, lay on my back with my legs 
 under the boat and my head hidden by the stern, 
 and began to swim backward. The boat began 
 mysteriously to move the wrong way. The 
 " Professor," as he called himself, paddled more 
 strongly, but the boat continued to move back- 
 ward. He became alarmed — some devil-fish 
 was running away with him! He peered over 
 the gunwale and over the bows, but saw noth- 
 ing. He now paddled frantically, his strength 
 increased by terror; but still the boat moved 
 backward! At last the laughter of the sailors, 
 no longer restrainable, revealed the situation to 
 him. He looked over the stern, and I, fearing a 
 retributive blow of the paddle on my head, Jet 
 go and swam away, convulsed with laughter. 
 After the first flush of anger he took the joke in 
 good part and joined in the fun. I continued 
 to swim and dive and play in the water for sev- 
 eral hours, enjoying it greatly. 
 
 The next day we were still becalmed and be- 
 136 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 came uneasy, as Agassiz might want us at the 
 fort. About midday, therefore, Captain Frye 
 sent us back in an open boat, rowed by two sail- 
 ors. On the way I made an interesting observa- 
 tion: About half way to the fort the boat 
 grounded on the level, densely growing prongs 
 of a coral grove (Madrepora). The prongs 
 were very thickly crowded, were all on nearly 
 the same level, and were all dead for about three 
 inches. It was exactly the phenomenon of a 
 clipped hedge. The coral tips were killed every 
 year by the depression of the water level. I 
 afterward used this as a basis for estimating 
 the rate of coral growth, the mode being given 
 in my Elements of Geology, page 147, and in 
 the American Journal of Science, 1875, x, 34-36. 
 While I was gone Agassiz also had made some 
 observations on Meandrina for the same pur- 
 pose. Next day the wind sprung up, the 
 schooner returned, and we sailed for Key 
 West, stopping again at the Marquesas on the 
 way back. 
 
 The scientific results of this visit to the Keys 
 of Florida I do not give here, because they were 
 published by Agassiz in the Report of the Coast 
 Survey for 1851. Some extensions of my own 
 were read before the American Association for 
 
 137 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGEAPHY 
 
 the Advancement of Science in 1856, and pub- 
 lished in their Proceedings * and in the Amer- 
 ican Journal of Science for January, 1857.f 
 This was my first really scientific paper. 
 
 While at Key West I became intensely inter- 
 ested in the wreckers and the wrecking schoon- 
 ers. Partly from the narrowness of the straits 
 between Key West and Cuba, through which the 
 Gulf Stream runs, partly from the variable rate 
 and direction of that current, but mainly from 
 the presence of the reefs, there are probably 
 more wrecks here than in any other place in the 
 world. The town of Key West, then the 
 largest town in Florida, having about twenty- 
 five hundred inhabitants, was built up wholly on 
 the wrecking business. There seemed to be no 
 other reason for its existence, the island being 
 a barren coral limestone, with almost no soil at 
 all, so that nothing eatable grows there except 
 cocoanuts. All foodstuffs except what the sea 
 gives — an abundance of the finest fish and green 
 turtles — are brought from the mainland of the 
 United States or from Cuba. The manner of 
 growth of the town was doubtless somewhat as 
 follows: First came the wreckers — from three 
 
 * X, pt. 2, 103-119. f Sec. ser., xxiii, 46-60. 
 
 138 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 to four hundred of them — to prey upon the car- 
 casses of dead ships; then came the merchants 
 and traders to prey upon the wreckers ; then 
 came the doctors and the lawyers to prey upon 
 both the traders and the wreckers ; and last 
 came the clergy of all denominations to pray for 
 all! The wrecking vessels are the finest mod- 
 els I have ever seen for speed and for close sail- 
 ing to the wind. They are built deep behind 
 and barely resting on the water in front, with 
 raking masts and an enormous spread of can- 
 vas. All this is necessary, because there is a 
 prize for the vessel that reaches the wreck first. 
 There may be a wreck during the night — in the 
 early morning, immediately on getting the news, 
 the whole fleet of wreckers, like a flock of white- 
 winged vultures, bears down upon the hapless 
 ship. It is a beautiful sight, and the race is 
 eagerly watched. 
 
 About half of our time was spent on the 
 steamer observing and collecting, and half on 
 shore examining, drawing, and packing away. 
 Our evenings on the steamer around the dining- 
 table after dinner were very enjoyable, as be- 
 sides our party and the ship's officers there were 
 on board several scientific men connected with 
 the Coast Survey, of whom I may especially 
 
 139 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 mention J. E. Hilgard and Count Pourtales. 
 Sometimes the talk was on scientific subjects, 
 sometimes on other subjects. I well remember 
 that one evening Agassiz, who had himself felt 
 the effects of the odium theolo gicum for his 
 views on the diversity of origin of man, was hot 
 in denunciation of the intolerance of society in 
 America. " Why," said he, " there is no free- 
 dom for a scientific man in America ! " 
 
 " Which, then, professor," some one asked, 
 " is the freest country you know ? " 
 
 " Austria," he replied unhesitatingly, " for 
 you can think and speak as you please there, if 
 you let politics alone; and for my own ]^art, I 
 care nothing for politics." 
 
 We left Key West after a stay of six weeks 
 and hastened back to Cambridge as fast as 
 steamer and railroad could carry us, passing in 
 three or four days from tropic summer to arc- 
 tic winter. Impatient to see our dear ones, we 
 left the cars a little before reaching Boston and 
 walked three or four miles to Cambridge, reach- 
 ing it about midnight. Thank God, all were 
 well and anxiously expecting our return. 
 
 The rest of the year was a repetition of the 
 former term, save that the study was still more 
 earnest. In addition to zoology and geology 
 \ 140 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 with Agassiz, I took a course in botany with 
 Gray. Practically there were no students in 
 Agassiz' laboratory but us two, so that we had 
 nearly all of Agassiz' time. Several wealthy 
 young men from New York did indeed join the 
 class, but they were utterly untrained and had 
 no idea of hard work; Agassiz could not waste 
 his time on them and they were soon disgusted 
 and quit. In May we went with Agassiz and 
 Hall to the Catskill Mountains and the Mo- 
 hawk Valley to study the New York system, 
 an excursion that was my first field work in 
 geology. 
 
 About June Agassiz asked us if we desired 
 to take degrees in the Lawrence Scientific 
 School. I was already a much graduated man, 
 having the degrees of A. B., A. M., and M. D., 
 and having graduated in matrimony and father- 
 hood; and had had no idea up to that time of 
 becoming a student in the Scientific School, or 
 indeed of having any official connection with 
 Harvard at all, having come simply to study 
 with Agassiz. But it was the first year of 
 operation of the school and they wished to have 
 something to show, and I was glad to take a de- 
 gree. Agassiz suggested as a subject for my 
 thesis, The Homologus of the Radiata, exactly 
 
 141 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 the one I myself would have chosen. I pon- 
 dered and wrote, and dissected and wrote, 
 con amove, illustrating every point by drawings 
 of my own, mostly diagrammatic* I was exam- 
 ined on the thesis by Agassiz, and publicly on 
 zoology and geology by Agassiz and Wyman; 
 and late in June or early in July took my de- 
 gree and diploma. 
 
 Thus it happened that Lewis Jones and I, 
 and two others, David A. Wells and John D. 
 Runkle, formed the first graduating class of the 
 Lawrence Scientific School. The courses of all 
 of us had, however, been strictly post-graduate, 
 and I believe we were the very beginnings of a 
 post-graduate class in Harvard, if not in the 
 United States. For that very reason they did 
 not know where to put us, as there was as yet 
 no provision at all for such students. 
 
 Graduation and a diploma meant nothing to 
 me ; I continued to study right along as if noth- 
 ing had happened, sometimes in Agassiz' labo- 
 ratory, sometimes in excursions along the coast 
 with Agassiz, sometimes by myself. For recre- 
 ation I took my wife and family to the Glades 
 near Cohasset, and while there made a careful 
 
 * The drawings I still have, but the manuscript I lost at the 
 time of Sherman's raid and the burning of Columbia, S. C, 
 
 142 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 study under the microscope of the development 
 of Bryozoa. Agassiz was greatly delighted 
 with the many drawings that I made, as he saw 
 some new and important things in them, and 
 urged me to prepare a paper for the American 
 Association for the Advancement of Science 
 which was to meet at Albany in August, 1851. 
 But I felt that I was not sufficiently acquainted 
 with the literature of the subject — I did not 
 know what was new in my drawings and what 
 was not — and the time before the meeting was 
 too short for adequate preparation. 
 
 My life in Cambridge constituted a third 
 crisis in my life. Think of the galaxy of stars 
 in Harvard at that time ! Agassiz, Guyot, Wy- 
 man, Gray, Peirce, Longfellow, Lowell, Holmes, 
 and Felton — with all of whom I was in almost 
 daily contact on the most intimate terms. 
 Emerson I saw sometimes, but not often. Rich- 
 ard Dana I met thrice every day at the table of 
 the house at which I boarded after returning 
 from Florida. The effect of this intellectual 
 atmosphere was in the highest degree stimulat- 
 ing, giving incredible impulse to thought. Mrs. 
 Le Conte too associated intimately with the fam- 
 ilies of the professors, especially with those of 
 Agassiz, Felton, and Peirce. Boston, moreover, 
 
 143 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 was near-by, and we took advantage of oppor- 
 tunities of hearing there the greatest musicians, 
 as Jenny Lind and Parody ; and I attended the 
 meetings of the scientific societies, the Ameri- 
 can Academy and the Society of Natural His- 
 tory. 
 
 The result of my long, intimate association 
 with Agassiz was, on my part, a great and ever- 
 increasing love, admiration, and reverence for 
 him, both as a scientist and as a man, and on his 
 part, I am sure, a very strong and affectionate 
 regard. A few extracts from my address at the 
 memorial exercises held in San Francisco the 
 week after his death may be quoted here as 
 showing what seem to me the true grounds of 
 his great reputation and the reasons for believ- 
 ing that it will be permanent, and my estimate 
 of what is most characteristic and original in 
 his philosophy.* 
 
 "As we look back over the history of sci- 
 ence, we see, at long intervals, certain men who 
 seem to tower far above their fellows. In what 
 consists their greatness? They are men who 
 have introduced great ideas or new methods into 
 science — ideas which extend the domain of 
 
 * Cf. also Chapter II of Evolution and its Relation to Re- 
 ligious Thought. 
 
 144 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 human thought, or methods which increase our 
 power over nature, facilitate the progress of 
 discovery, and thus open the way to the con- 
 quest of new fields. Such men were Coperni- 
 cus, and Galileo, and Kepler, and Newton, and 
 Herschel, in astronomy; such were Linnaeus, 
 and Buff on, and Cuvier, and Agassiz, in organic 
 science. . . . 
 
 " Yes, Agassiz was the originator of a great 
 new idea in geology, and the introducer or per- 
 fecter of a new method in organic science. . . . 
 I desire to fix your attention on only one great 
 idea introduced by him, viz.: the idea that gla- 
 ciers are now, and have been to a much greater 
 extent in a previous epoch, a great geological 
 agent, sculpturing our mountains and determin- 
 ing the forms of our continents. . . . Before 
 Agassiz, the study of glaciers was the study of 
 nice questions in physics, and of interest princi- 
 pally to special physicists. Agassiz transferred 
 the whole subject into the broad domain of 
 geology, and gave it a far deeper, broader, and 
 more general interest. The result was not only 
 a powerful impulse to the study of glaciers, but 
 a flood of light shed upon the whole later geo- 
 logical history of our earth, and thus an enor- 
 mous impulse to geology also. 
 11 145 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 " But I said that Agassiz was a great re- 
 former in zoology also — that he was also, if not 
 the first introducer, at least the perfecter of the 
 great method of organic science. This must 
 ever remain the chiefest glory of Agassiz. Yes, 
 far greater than all his great works in zoology 
 — as great as these are, a monument of industry 
 and genius — far greater than these is the 
 method which underlies them, and which has im- 
 pregnated all modern zoology. . . . 
 
 " As soon as we leave the field of abstract 
 thought and rise into the field of phenomena, 
 observation commences. But as in the field of 
 pure thought, thought can accomplish little with- 
 out method ; so in the field of phenomena, obser- 
 vation can accomplish little without the assist- 
 ance of method. The phenomena of the external 
 world are so complex, so affected by disturb- 
 ing forces and conditions, that in order to 
 be understood they must first be simplified. 
 The scientist, therefore, by experiment, removes 
 one condition after another, until the true 
 cause and necessary condition is perceived. 
 This is the great method of experiment upon 
 which rests the whole fabric of physics and 
 chemistry. But when we rise still higher into 
 the field of organized bodies, the phenomena 
 
 146 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 become infinitely more complex and infinitely 
 more difficult to understand without the assist- 
 ance of method, and yet, just here, the method 
 of experiment fails us, or, at least, can be used 
 only to a very limited extent. The conditions 
 of life are so complex, so nicely adjusted, so 
 delicately balanced, that when we attempt to in- 
 troduce our rude hands in the way of experi- 
 ment, we overthrow the equilibrium, we destroy 
 the very conditions of our experiment, viz., life. 
 In this dilemma, what shall we do? Fortu- 
 nately, nature herself prepares for us a most 
 elaborate series of experiments. The phe- 
 nomena of life in the higher animals and plants 
 are indeed far too complex to be understood; 
 but if commencing with these we go down the 
 scale, we find these phenomena becoming sim- 
 pler and simpler until they reach the simplest ex- 
 pression in the microscopic cell or microscopic 
 spherule of protoplasm. The equation of life is 
 reduced to its simplest terms, and then, only, 
 we begin to find the value of the unknown quan- 
 tity. This series I will call the natural history 
 series. Again, nature prepares for us another 
 series of experiments. Commencing with the 
 mature condition of the higher animals, and go- 
 ing backward along the line of individual his- 
 
 147 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tory, through the stages of embryo, egg, and 
 germ, we find again the phenomena of life be- 
 come simpler and simpler, until we again reach 
 the simplest condition in the microscopic cell. 
 This I will call the embryonic series. Again, 
 that there might be no excuse for man's ignor- 
 ance of the laws of life, nature prepares still 
 another series of experiments. Commencing 
 with the fauna and flora of the present time, and 
 going back along the track of geological history, 
 through Tertiary, Secondary, Paleozoic, and 
 Eozoic, to the very dawn of life, we find a series 
 of organic forms becoming simpler and simpler, 
 until we again reach the simplest term in the 
 lowest conceivable forms of life. This I will 
 call the geological or paleontological, or evolu- 
 tion series. 
 
 " Now it has been by extensive comparison 
 in each of these series up and down, and by ex- 
 tensive comparison of the three series with each 
 other, that our knowledge of organisms has 
 gradually become scientific; that mere accumu- 
 lation of facts and phenomena has grown into 
 science ; that a mere heap of useless rubbish has 
 been changed into a beautiful edifice. This is 
 what is called the method of comparison — the 
 great method used in the science of life. Yes, 
 
 148 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 anatomy only becomes scientific through com- 
 parative anatomy. Physiology only becomes 
 scientific through comparative physiology ; and I 
 may add, psychology will never become scien- 
 tific except through comparative psychology. 
 
 " So much I have said to show you the na- 
 ture and power of scientific methods and espe- 
 cially of that method — the method of compari- 
 son — upon which rests the whole fabric of the 
 science of organisms. Now what has Agassiz 
 done in perfecting this method? I will attempt 
 to explain. 
 
 " We have seen that this method consists of 
 three subordinate methods which lead to similar 
 results, viz. : comparison in the three series, the 
 natural history series, the embryonic series, and 
 the geological series. Now Cuvier and his co- 
 laborers introduced and perfected comparison 
 in the natural history series and thus laid the 
 foundation of scientific zoology; but Agassiz 
 and Von Baer and their colaborers extended the 
 method of comparison into the embryonic and 
 geological series, and also into the relation of 
 the three series to each other; and thus greatly 
 perfected the method and increased its power. 
 Others, no doubt many others, assisted in the 
 great work, but Agassiz was unquestionably the 
 
 149 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 leader in the movement. For forty years 
 Agassiz worked incessantly, enthusiastically — 
 even to the breaking down of his strong physi- 
 cal constitution and the sacrifice of his life — on 
 the ideas and the.methods conceived in his youth. 
 7s not this a great life? 
 
 " Finally, let us glance at some of the results 
 of Agassiz' method. The direct result is too 
 familiar and obvious to dwell on. We see it in 
 the amazing impulse given to Biology and its 
 consequent great and ever-increasing progress 
 in recent time. I will only very briefly draw 
 your attention to the indirect results — i. e., re- 
 sults which were not in the mind of Agassiz nor 
 aimed at by him. 
 
 " 1. Agassiz' work and Agassiz' method pre- 
 pared the whole ground and laid the whole foun- 
 dation for the modern doctrine of evolution. 
 The idea of the similarity of the three series 
 mentioned above — the natural history, the em- 
 bryonic, and the paleontological — and therefore 
 the light which each sheds on the others, a view so 
 long insisted on by Agassiz and so tardily and 
 grudgingly accepted by zoologists, forms the 
 whole scientific basis, and comparison in these 
 three series, the whole scientific method, of the 
 theory of evolution. Evolution is develop- 
 
 150 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 ment. Evolution of the organic kingdom is de- 
 velopment of the organic kingdom through geo- 
 logic times. No one insisted so long and so 
 strongly on development of the organic king- 
 dom through geologic times as did Agassiz. 
 All that is grandest and most certain in evolu- 
 tion, viz.: development from lower to higher, 
 from simpler to more complex, from general to 
 special by a process of successive differentia- 
 tion, has always been insisted on by Agassiz, 
 and until recently only grudgingly accepted by 
 English zoologists and geologists. In this 
 sense, therefore, Agassiz is the great apostle of 
 evolution. It was only the present theories of 
 evolution, or evolution by transmutation, which 
 he rejected. His was an evolution not by 
 organic forces within, but according to an intelli- 
 gent plan without— am evolution not by transmu- 
 tation of species, but by substitution of one spe- 
 cies for another. In the true spirit of inductive 
 caution, perhaps of excessive caution, he con- 
 fined himself strictly to the formal laws of evolu- 
 tion, and no man has done so much in establish- 
 ing these as he; but he regarded the cause of 
 evolution as beyond the domain of science, and 
 all attempts at a causal theory as at least prema- 
 ture if not altogether vain. 
 
 151 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 " 2. Agassiz' work and Agassiz' method has 
 laid the only foundation of a possible scientific 
 sociology. Society also is an organized body, 
 and therefore subject to the laws of organisms. 
 Society, too, passes by evolution from lower to 
 higher, from simpler to more complex, from 
 general to special, by a process of successive 
 differentiation. Society progresses, develops. 
 This is the most glorious doctrine of modern 
 times. The phenomena of society, however, are 
 even more complex than those of organisms, and 
 therefore still more in want of a method. But 
 we have already seen that phenomena which are 
 too complex to be analyzed by experiment can 
 only be brought into subjection by the method 
 of comparison. If, then, there shall ever be a 
 scientific sociology, it must be by the use of the 
 same methods which are used in biology ; it must 
 be by the comparison of social institutions, gov- 
 ernments, civilizations, etc., in all stages of de- 
 velopment ; it must be by extensive comparison 
 of social phenomena in three series, first, as ex- 
 hibited in different races and nations in various 
 stages, as now existing in different places, cor- 
 responding to the natural history series ; sec- 
 ond, as exhibited in various stages of advance of 
 the same nation from barbarism to civilization, 
 
 152 
 
STUDY WITH AGASSIZ 
 
 corresponding to the embryonic series ; third, as 
 exhibited in the slow onward progress of the 
 ivhole race through rude stone age, polished 
 stone age, bronze age, and iron age, correspond- 
 ing to the paleontological series. It is by com- 
 parisons of this kind that Herbert Spencer is 
 now attempting to lay the foundations of a 
 scientific sociology. I repeat it: if sociology 
 ever becomes a science it will owe much to the 
 genius and the method of Louis Agassiz." 
 
 153 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 PROFESSORSHIPS IN OGLETHORPE UNIVERSITY, THE 
 UNIVERSITY OE GEORGIA, AND SOUTH CAROLINA 
 COLLEGE 
 
 After a residence of about fifteen months 
 I left Cambridge and all my dear friends there 
 in the middle of October, 1851, and went to New 
 York for a visit of some ten days with my uncle 
 there. Thence we went on to Savannah by 
 steamer. On landing I was greatly shocked to 
 hear of the death of my brother Lewis, who had 
 accidentally shot himself and fallen a victim to 
 his passion for gunning. About the first of No- 
 vember we went out to Liberty, and during the 
 following month I received a call to take the 
 professorship of the sciences at Oglethorpe 
 University, Midway, Georgia. I was to teach 
 all the sciences except astronomy, which was 
 attached to the mathematical chair. All the 
 sciences! But I must begin. The salary was 
 only a thousand dollars a year, but as I had 
 other sources of income I accepted. 
 
 154 
 
IN OGLETHORPE UNIVERSITY 
 
 I had now finished preparation and begun my 
 life-work. Henceforth, until the war of '61, my 
 life ran comparatively smoothly. It consisted 
 almost wholly of intellectual work. Besides 
 the routine of teaching, I was engaged mainly 
 in thinking, investigating, and writing and pub- 
 lishing papers. But during the first year 
 teaching occupied all my time. I taught all the 
 sciences, except zoology, the very one for which 
 I had especially prepared myself. I was not 
 sorry for this, however, for how could I teach 
 zoology without a laboratory? At that time 
 there was not even a text-book on the subject. 
 Botany I could manage better, for I had Gray's 
 Structural and Physiological Botany, a really 
 excellent text-book. I could gather plants and 
 dissect them, and I had a first-rate microscope. 
 I therefore taught mechanics, physics, chemis- 
 try, geology, and botany. This was excellent 
 training for me, for it kept alive my interest in 
 all departments of science, which is especially 
 necessary in geology, which was to become my 
 chief study. I believe I was successful, not 
 only in teaching but also in gaining the affec- 
 tions of my pupils. 
 
 The previous August Lewis Jones had been 
 elected professor of geology and natural his- 
 
 155 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tory in the University of Georgia, a much better 
 position than mine, paying twice the salary, and 
 one for which I certainly should have made ap- 
 plication had he not repeatedly told me of his 
 intention of applying, so that I could not be an 
 applicant without seeming to violate confidence 
 and friendship. But he got on badly with the 
 president, who had the reputation of being a 
 bigoted, dogmatic, and imperious old man, and 
 after holding the chair only a year resigned in 
 anger and disgust. I at once determined to ap- 
 ply for the place, and wrote to my brother John, 
 who was a professor in the institution. To my 
 disgust I learned that geology and botany was 
 not considered enough for one man, and that 
 French would be tacked on. French had always 
 wandered from one professor to another, seek- 
 ing rest but finding none ; when I was a student, 
 it was tacked on to physics ; its present habitat 
 was the chair of geology and natural history. 
 I read French with ease, but I could not speak 
 it, so immediately began taking lessons from an 
 excellent native French teacher. I was elected 
 in December, 1852, and moved to Athens in the 
 following month. 
 
 Still I had no zoology to teach, and I was 
 glad of it. Agassiz had introduced an entirely 
 
 156 
 
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 new mode of studying and teaching zoology, and 
 my preparation was entirely ahead of the times ; 
 the colleges were not yet ready for the new 
 method. My duties were, therefore, the teach- 
 ing of geology, botany, and French. After six 
 months, however, a French teacher was elected, 
 and my work was confined to geology and bot- 
 any, with a Monday morning class in natural 
 theology. All Monday morning classes were of 
 a more or less religious nature, because such 
 subjects were supposed suitable for Sunday 
 study. This natural theology class I greatly 
 enjoyed, as it gave me an opportunity of bring- 
 ing out homologies of the animal kingdom or 
 general laws of animal structure as evidence of 
 a divine plan. The students were intensely in- 
 terested, as it was all new to them. But the 
 lack of zoology in my course, with this excep- 
 tion, carried my thought and work more and 
 more in the direction of geology. 
 
 The conditions in Athens were far more fa- 
 vorable for intellectual activity than were those 
 in Midway. I had the great advantage of inti- 
 mate association, continued ever after, with my 
 brother John, whose scientific knowledge was 
 the widest and most accurate I have ever known. 
 Then there was McCay, formerly my teacher 
 
 157 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and now my colleague, an excellent mathemati- 
 cian and a man of the clearest thought and most 
 exact method. Later there were LeRoy Brown 
 and C. S. Venable. With the rest of the fac- 
 ulty, except with the younger men, especially 
 Scherb, the instructor in French, and Henry 
 Waddell, instructor in Latin, I had little intel- 
 lectual sympathy. There were also several men 
 of great intelligence in the community, such as 
 Hope Hull, Tom Cobb, Judge Lumpkin, and the 
 Rev. Mr. Linebaugh. John and I took a walk 
 of two or three miles in the forest every morn- 
 ing before going to work, and Mr. Linebaugh 
 usually joined us. 
 
 During the long winter vacation in 1854, in- 
 stead of going to our plantation in Liberty 
 County as usual, we went to Philadelphia and 
 Cambridge. My uncle Jack had moved from 
 New York to Philadelphia, and in the evenings 
 his house was the gathering place of scientific 
 men; John Fraser, Elwin, Phillips, Lea, and 
 many others. One evening John Fraser brought 
 with him the newly invented instrument, the 
 stereoscope. I had never before seen one, but I 
 had read carefully and with delight all that had 
 been published by Wheatstone in description of 
 the instrument and in explanation of its wonder- 
 
 158 
 
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 ful effects. His theory, it will be remembered, 
 was that when the images of two dissimilar pic- 
 tures fall on the retinae dissimilar in the same 
 way and to the same degree as those formed 
 by a real object or scene, the two dissimilar 
 images are mentally fused into one, and appear 
 as a real solid object or an actual scene. Wheat- 
 stone's explanation had seemed to me very com- 
 plete and beautiful, and I was eager to test it 
 by looking through the stereoscope at the dia- 
 grams used to show its effects. The instru- 
 ment passed around, and the beautiful effects 
 and the completeness of Wheatstone's theory 
 were commented on. At last it came round to 
 me as one of the youngest of the party. I 
 looked long and delightfully at the stereoscopic 
 effect, and then remarked, " Yes, it is very beau- 
 tiful, but Wheatstone's theory is not true ; there 
 is no mental fusion at all, for when I look at the 
 farther lines of the united diagrams, the nearer 
 ones are doubled, and when I look at the nearer 
 lines, the farther ones are doubled, and further- 
 more, the stereoscopic effect is the result of this 
 doubling." Exclamations of surprise and dis- 
 sent were heard on every side. I was unani- 
 mously set down as a very conceited and dis- 
 putatious young man thus to set up my opinion 
 
 159 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 against that of the Great Wheatstone. I was, 
 of course, silenced; but I knew I was right. 
 From early childhood I had amused myself 
 with experiments on binocular combination of 
 figures, and had acquired unusual power of 
 analysis of visual impressions. I saw plainly 
 what they did not see. I was perfectly con- 
 scious of looking nearer and farther, and of 
 watching the slight doubling and reunion of the 
 lines. I was young and did not sufficiently ap- 
 preciate the importance of my discovery (for it 
 was nothing less) as I should have done. The 
 very theory that I advocated that night was 
 brought out about a year later by Briicke. 
 
 While in Philadelphia I ransacked the city 
 for print-shops, especially old ones hidden away 
 in cellars in out-of-the-way places, and bought 
 many beautiful engravings, among them a com- 
 plete set of Retzsch's outlines. I thus began 
 a collection of inexpensive art, which has been 
 a source of unfailing delight to me, and of cul- 
 ture to my children. 
 
 From Philadelphia we went to Cambridge to 
 see our friends and to renew old associations 
 there. As soon as Agassiz knew that we had 
 arrived, he and Mrs. Agassiz called and invited 
 us to stay at their home, an invitation that we, 
 
 160 
 
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 of course, accepted. We spent a week with 
 Agassiz, and a more delightful week it is im- 
 possible to imagine. The domestic life of Agas- 
 siz was indeed charming, for Mrs. Agassiz (his 
 second wife) was not only an affectionate wife 
 but one of the wisest of women. He had with 
 him at this time his son Alexander, then in col- 
 lege, and his two daughters, Ida and Pauline, 
 who had just arrived from Neuchatel. They 
 were beautiful girls, the one blonde like her 
 father, the other dark and high featured, doubt- 
 less like her mother. Agassiz was in high 
 spirits and very happy. He took a great fancy 
 to my little Sallie, who had been born in Cam- 
 bridge and was then just three years old. She 
 was very bright and very quick to learn, and 
 spoke with remarkable distinctness. Agassiz 
 taught her the names of all his dearest speci- 
 mens ; and partly because she pronounced the 
 difficult word so distinctly, with true French ac- 
 cent, partly because she was a little quick-tem- 
 pered, he called her " the little Echinoderm." A 
 little child in the home ! It seemed to bring back 
 the joy of his early married life. He was con- 
 tinually playing with the child, even taking her 
 on his back and getting down on his hands and 
 knees and " playing horse " all around the din- 
 12 161 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ing-table. This fondness for little children, this 
 child-likeness of nature, was one of the most 
 beautiful traits of Agassiz' character; and yet 
 it is not brought out in any of his biographies, 
 not even in that written by his wife. Women, I 
 think, are so jealous of the dignity of their hus- 
 bands, that they do not like such exhibitions of 
 primal human nature in the presence of others. 
 Agassiz in all of his subsequent letters to me 
 never failed to ask after " the little Echino- 
 derm." 
 
 Agassiz' house was, of course, the gathering 
 place of distinguished men. It was here at 
 evening teas that I first became well acquainted 
 with Oliver Wendell Holmes, whose father had 
 been pastor of the Midway church. I infinitely 
 enjoyed his delicious chirping — I know no other 
 word that expresses it — over his tea. 
 
 During the four years that I spent in 
 Athens I wrote four or five articles — popular, 
 scientific, educational, and philosophical. These 
 I regarded mainly as a practise in the art of 
 exposition, and therefore published in the stu- 
 dents' magazine. The first important paper I 
 ever wrote was entitled On the Agency of the 
 Gulf Stream in the Formation of the Peninsula 
 and Keys of Florida. It was based on my own 
 
 162 
 
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 observations in 1851 and on the subsequent pub- 
 lications of Agassiz on the reefs of Florida, 
 and, as has been stated, was read before the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Science at its meeting at Albany in 1856, creat- 
 ing marked interest. It was afterward pub- 
 lished in the Proceedings of the Association * 
 and in the number of the American Journal of 
 Science f that followed the meeting, and was the 
 beginning of my scientific reputation. The con- 
 clusions reached in it have been substantially 
 sustained by subsequent observation, although 
 with some important modifications by Alexan- 
 der Agassiz. My ideas concerning the mode of 
 formation of barrier reefs, without subsidence, 
 were again brought out thirty years later by 
 Captain Guppy, of the British Navy; but my 
 priority was frankly acknowledged by him as 
 soon as his attention was drawn to my paper. 
 
 In 1854 McCay left the University of Geor- 
 gia and went to Columbia, South Carolina, and 
 LeRoy Brown was put in his place. In 1855 my 
 brother John resigned to take the lectureship in 
 chemistry in the College of Physicians and Sur- 
 geons, New York, and Venable was put in his 
 
 * X, pt. 2, 103-119. f Sec. ser., xxiii, 46-60. 
 
 163 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 place. People began to inquire why it was that 
 the best men continued to leave the University 
 of Georgia. The president, Dr. Church, unfor- 
 tunately undertook to answer, and brought such 
 allegations against members of the faculty that 
 McCay, John Le Conte, Lewis Jones, Nahum 
 Wood, and Tom Pond were, in self-defense, 
 drawn into a controversy that finally involved 
 the whole faculty and led to the removal of all 
 by the Board of Trustees. I immediately ap- 
 plied for the professorship of chemistry and 
 geology in South Carolina College, a position 
 then vacant ; was elected in December, 1856 ; and 
 began work there in January, 1857. In October 
 John had been elected to the chair of physics 
 in the same college, so that he, McCay, and I 
 were again colleagues, McCay being president. 
 In the interval between my resigning from 
 the University of Georgia and beginning work 
 in South Carolina, I was invited by Professor 
 Henry to deliver six lectures at the Smithson- 
 ian Institution at Washington. In December, 
 1856, I therefore gave three lectures on coal 
 and three on coral reefs. They were delivered 
 unwritten, but those on coal were afterward 
 written out and published in the Smithsonian 
 Report for 1857, pp. 119-168. They were highly 
 
 164 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 commended at the time by the best men in the 
 country, e. g., ex-President Fillmore, and were 
 translated and republished in France. In them 
 were brought out some views concerning the 
 affinities of gymnosperms that anticipated by 
 thirty years similar views brought out by Lester 
 Ward in America and Engler in Germany. 
 
 While in Washington I spent a week with 
 Professor Henry and can never forget his 
 charming family life with his wife and daugh- 
 ters and the wonderful suggestiveness of his 
 conversation. Just forty years later, in Decem- 
 ber, 1896, 1 was again entertained by the daugh- 
 ters, who still live in Washington. 
 — • My chair in the South Carolina College was, 
 as has been said, chemistry and geology. In 
 geology I was all right, but as I had taught 
 chemistry but one year at Oglethorpe I had to 
 work hard to get up a good course of lectures 
 on that subject. McCay, moreover, besides be- 
 ing president had on his hands the very heavy 
 chair of mathematics, and this being more than 
 he could possibly do without help, he asked 
 me to take his freshman classes. This I did, 
 though very reluctantly. It was, however, not 
 without benefit to me, as it revived my interest 
 in mathematics, very necessary in physical and 
 
 165 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 dynamical geology. It also brought me into 
 closer contact with the students. This was a 
 very busy year with me ; I had three lectures a 
 week in geology, three in chemistry, and four 
 recitations in algebra and geometry, ten exer- 
 cises a week in all. It was impossible to do any 
 original work. 
 
 After five or six months of this routine work, 
 there occurred another catastrophe and a gen- 
 eral resignation of the whole faculty. It was a 
 very painful affair, of which I can give only a 
 brief outline. A fuller account may be found 
 in La Borde's History of the South Carolina 
 College. 
 
 The students here were very high-spirited 
 and honorable, but also quite turbulent. They 
 had been accustomed to being governed not so 
 much by law as by the personal influence and 
 eloquence of Thornwell, the previous presi- 
 dent. McCay was not popular — he was no 
 speaker. Thornwell by his personal magnet- 
 ism had created a very high sense of honor and 
 truthfulness among the students; they would 
 not tolerate among themselves or in their teach- 
 ers the least indirectness of method. There had 
 been some trifling breach of discipline and three 
 of the students were suspended for two weeks. 
 
 166 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE v. 
 
 The whole body of students petitioned for their 
 restoration. McCay, knowing that his presi- 
 dency was on trial, tried to arrange matters so 
 as to avoid collision with the student body. 
 The students thought that his method was in- 
 direct and deceptive, and positively refused to 
 attend his classes. Several members of the fac- 
 ulty had many interviews with their committee, 
 but they would not yield. The student body was 
 in open revolt against the president but not 
 against the faculty; other recitations they at- 
 tended as usual, but to McCay's they would not 
 go. The faculty could not act because its mem- 
 bers were divided among themselves ; there was 
 an old regime and a new, John and I being re- 
 garded as in the new. The Board of Trustees 
 was therefore called together, the resignations 
 of the whole faculty were asked for, and the 
 College disbanded. Three of us, my brother, 
 Professor Rivers, and I, were immediately re- 
 elected; and all the other chairs and the pres- 
 idency were left vacant until the reorganization 
 of the College in October. 
 
 As the College was broken up in May, nearly 
 a month before the end of the term, there was a 
 long vacation of about four months. I took ad- 
 vantage of this to visit the Virginia Springs and 
 
 167 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 the University of Virginia. At the springs I 
 met a number of the professors of the Uni- 
 versity, especially McGufTy, Holcombe, and 
 Cabell, and greatly enjoyed my intimate asso- 
 ciation with them, particularly the long walks 
 and talks with McGufTy, certainly one of the 
 most suggestive minds I ever came into contact 
 with. I also enjoyed immensely the celebrated 
 swimming baths of these springs. 
 
 In August, leaving my wife and two children 
 at the springs pleasantly situated and with the 
 best of company, I went to Montreal to attend 
 the meeting of the American Association for the 
 Advancement of Science. This meeting was an 
 eminently successful one, a number of English 
 scientists being present. The people of Mon- 
 treal were very hospitable, and got up several 
 delightful excursions on the St. Lawrence and 
 to the Saguenay. But the striking event of 
 the meeting was the address of Hall, the retir- 
 ing president, on The Formation of Moun- 
 tain Chains by Sedimentation. The idea was 
 entirely new and very important. But a new 
 idea is always taken in with difficulty, and Hall 
 was far from clear in his exposition, so that he 
 was not understood. I was sitting immediately 
 in front of Guyot, who, after Hall had been 
 
 168 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 trying for nearly an hour to make himself un- 
 derstood, leaned over and whispered in my 
 ear, " Do you understand what he is talking 
 about?" "Not a word!" I answered. It is 
 evident now that he was bringing out a very 
 important truth, though a very insufficient 
 theory of mountain origin. Geologists were 
 not then ready for the truth contained in the 
 address, and therefore it did not bear fruit for 
 many years. 
 
 On my way back I stayed for two weeks in 
 Charlottesville and became intimately ac- 
 quainted with three other professors of the 
 University of Virginia, Holmes, Bledsoe, and 
 Gildersleeve. Surely the University at that 
 time had a very strong corps of professors, and 
 certainly my association with them was very 
 stimulating to thought. 
 
 In September the Trustees of the South 
 Carolina College met, and all the former mem- 
 bers of the faculty except McCay and Pelham 
 were reelected. The College reopened in Octo- 
 ber with La Borde, the oldest member of the 
 faculty, as acting president and Venable in the 
 chair of mathematics. In January, 1858, Judge 
 A. B. Longstreet was elected president. He 
 was an able lawyer and judge and a distin- 
 
 169 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 guished humorist, as all know who have read 
 his Georgia Scenes, Characters, Incidents, etc., 
 in the First Half Century of the Republic; but 
 he was utterly unfit for the presidency of a col- 
 lege. He was not in any sense a cultured man, 
 and could not inspire the highest respect of 
 either the students or the faculty. He was not, 
 however, wanting in firmness; and as the 
 students had been made more turbulent than 
 ever by their apparent triumph of the previous 
 year, it was plainly to be seen that a catas- 
 trophe was impending. Calhoun's birthday 
 was always observed as a holiday, but usually 
 exercises were suspended for only a part of the 
 day. The students asked for the entire day; 
 the faculty gave all but the morning exercise, 
 wishing to hold them to their rooms the previous 
 night. The students then tarred the benches of 
 all the recitation rooms, rendering them unfit 
 for use. On being asked to other rooms some 
 classes obeyed and some refused. The refusal 
 was regarded as a combination to defeat the 
 law, and about a hundred and twenty stu- 
 dents, more than half of the number in the 
 College, were suspended until the opening of 
 the October term, that is, for more than five 
 months. t They were required, moreover, to 
 
 170 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 stand a rigid examination on all that had 
 been passed over in the meantime, a very 
 hard condition, as many subjects were taught 
 only by lectures. All of them tried the ex- 
 amination in October, and about one-half suc- 
 ceeded. In January those rejected tried again, 
 and again a half succeeded; the remaining 
 twenty-five or thirty then gave it up. The 
 effect of this sharp discipline was excellent; we 
 had no more trouble. 
 
 I have said that the students in the South 
 Carolina College were high-spirited though tur- 
 bulent. I should add that I had never previ- 
 ously seen (nor have I since) so high a sense of 
 honor among students in their relations to one 
 another and to the faculty. No form of un- 
 truthfulness among themselves or toward the 
 faculty (such, for example, as cheating at ex- 
 aminations) was for a moment tolerated. Any 
 student suspected of such practises was cut 
 by his fellow-students and compelled to leave. 
 "When a student was brought up before the 
 faculty for any offense, no other question was 
 asked but, " Did you have anything to do with 
 this affair? " The answer was " Yes " or " No," 
 and he was condemned or acquitted on his own 
 statement. Sometimes a student might on some 
 
 171 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 technical ground refuse to answer, but no one 
 ever lied. 
 
 My life in Columbia was perhaps the most 
 pleasant in my whole career. The society was 
 the most refined and cultivated I have ever 
 known. My wife was delighted. Three insti- 
 tutions of learning, the South Carolina College, 
 the Theological Seminary, and the Military 
 Academy (Arsenal), formed the nucleus about 
 which gathered many intellectual men and 
 women. Such men as Dr. Thornwell, Dr. Palm- 
 er, William C. Preston, and Wade Hampton 
 are rare in any community. My intellectual 
 activity was powerfully stimulated, and I wrote 
 many articles, mostly of a literary and philo- 
 sophical nature, as, for instance, my inaugural 
 address in December, 1857, on The Place of 
 Geology in a Course of Education; The Rela- 
 tion of Morphology to Fine Art; The General 
 Principles of a Liberal Education ; Female Edu- 
 cation; The Relation of School, College, and 
 University to One Another and to Active Life; 
 The Relation of Biology to Sociology ; and The 
 Nature and Uses of Fine Art. The first four of 
 these were given as addresses before academic 
 audiences ; the others were written without 
 any intention of publication, but only because 
 
 172 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 the thoughts were burning within and must 
 come out in expression. After having been 
 written, they were thrown into my drawer, and 
 afterward, sometimes months afterward, were 
 begged from me by Dr. Thornwell and pub- 
 lished in the Southern Presbyterian Review. 
 They were afterward recast and published 
 severally in the Princeton Review,* the Popular 
 Science Monthly, f and the Overland Monthly4 
 Meanwhile, however, pure science was not 
 neglected, for in 1859 I wrote and read before 
 the American Association for the Advance- 
 ment of Science my original paper on The Cor- 
 relation of Physical, Chemical, and Vital Force, 
 and the Conservation of Force in Vital Phe- 
 nomena. This created great interest among 
 scientific men at the time. It was published in 
 the Proceedings * of the Association and repub- 
 lished in full in the American Journal of Sci- 
 ence, || and the London, Edinburgh, and Dublin 
 Philosophical Magazine, A and in abstract in the 
 Canadian Naturalist.O Still later I recast it in 
 more popular form and published it in the Pop- 
 
 * N. S., v, 177-204. || Sec. ser., xxyiii, 305-319. 
 
 f XIV, 325-336, 425-434. A XIX, 133. 
 
 % Sec. ser., v, 337-347. First ser., iv, 291-293. 
 •XIII, 187-203. 
 
 173 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ular Science Monthly in 1873,* and again as an 
 appendix to Stewart's Conservation of Energy, 
 of the International Scientific Series. 
 
 The summer of 1858 was spent by my broth- 
 er's family and my own at Flat Rock, in North 
 Carolina. This beautiful place is the summer 
 resort of many of the most cultured families of 
 Charleston and the low countries generally, 
 some of whom have here charming houses and 
 grounds, with fountains, artificial lakes, etc. 
 We were often invited to dine with these de- 
 lightful people. I took advantage of this 
 opportunity to visit Asheville, to climb Black 
 Mountain (Mt. Mitchell), the highest peak of 
 the Appalachians, 6,710 feet high, and to run 
 down the French Broad River. The scenery in 
 this region, in which Biltmore was subse- 
 quently located, is the finest I have yet seen in 
 the United States. 
 
 I take this opportunity to do justice to the 
 brilliancy and originality of Langdon Chevts, a 
 planter on the coast of South Carolina, near the 
 Savannah River, by recording some views of his 
 expressed to me in a conversation at Flat Rock 
 on the origin of species. We had both read that 
 
 * IV, 156-170. 
 
 174 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 remarkable book Vestiges of the Natural History 
 of Creation, published in 1844, and he had cor- 
 dially embraced the idea of origin of species by 
 transmutation of previous species, while I con- 
 trarily held to Agassiz' views of creation ac- 
 cording to a preordained plan. We had it hot 
 and heavy. When I brought forward the ap- 
 parently unanswerable objection drawn from 
 the geographical distribution of species and the 
 manner in which contiguous fauna pass into one 
 another, i. e., by substitution instead of trans- 
 mutation, his answer was exactly what an evo- 
 lutionist would give to-day — viz., that inter- 
 mediate links would be killed off in the strug- 
 gle for life as less suited to the environment; 
 in other words that only the fittest would sur- 
 vive. It must be remembered that this was be- 
 fore the publication of Darwin's book, and the 
 answer was wholly new to me and struck me 
 very forcibly. 
 
 Why did he not publish his idea? No one 
 well acquainted with the Southern people, and 
 especially with the Southern planters, would ask 
 such a question. Nothing could be more re- 
 markable than the wide reading, the deep reflec- 
 tion, the refined culture, and the originality of 
 thought and observation characteristic of them ; 
 
 175 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and yet the idea of publication never even en- 
 tered their minds. What right had any one to 
 publish unless it was something of the greatest 
 importance, something that would revolution- 
 ize thought? My father was an extreme in- 
 stance of such indifference to publication, and 
 I myself for the same reason was slow to pub- 
 lish. Many important observations that I made 
 on the geological processes going on about me 
 everywhere in the South, especially on the for- 
 mation of soil by the rotting down of rocks 
 in situ and on mountain sculpture in Tennessee, 
 I gave every year in my class lectures, but did 
 not dream of publishing. Soon after the war 
 Hall and Hunt visited the South and brought 
 out these same facts, and very rightly received 
 due credit therefor. 
 
 In October, 1858, appeared the splendid 
 comet of Donati, the most magnificent celestial 
 phenomenon I had ever seen. With what won- 
 der and intense yearning I gazed at it every 
 night ! From early boyhood this upward yearn- 
 ing of my soul as if it would go out of me has 
 always affected me in the presence of the starry 
 heavens, especially when I gazed at the bright 
 evening star. This yearning now returned 
 upon me in the presence of this glorious comet. 
 
 176 
 
IN SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE 
 
 The summer of 1859 I spent mostly in 
 Columbia, as Mrs. Le Conte was not well. 
 After an absence of two weeks attending the 
 meeting of the American Association for the 
 Advancement of Science, where I read a paper, 
 as previously stated, I came back to my family, 
 who had been staying with my sister at Orange- 
 burg, and we all returned to Columbia, where 
 my third daughter, Josephine Eloise, was born 
 on the twenty-ninth of September. Little 
 Josie, dear little Josie ! I can not even mention 
 her name without the tenderest emotions. She 
 was the most beautiful child we ever had, with 
 that rare combination of flaxen hair and dark 
 eyes. Alas! we lost her just two years later. 
 The light, the sunlight, the spiritual light 
 seemed to have gone out of my house. Is it 
 possible that the object of such love can be other 
 than immortal? If it is mortal, then the noblest 
 feelings of our nature are vain and should be 
 suppressed. Surely this can not be true. 
 
 13 177 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 IN TIME OF WAB 
 
 During the summer of 1860 I was again 
 absent from Columbia for two weeks, attending 
 the meeting of the American Association for the 
 Advancement of Science, at Newport, at which 
 meeting I was elected the General Secretary of 
 the Association. This was the last meeting held 
 until the one in Nashville in 1866, and was there- 
 fore memorable. Every one felt a deep, sup- 
 pressed uneasiness concerning the political con- 
 ditions of the country. It was like the stifling 
 air before a storm. Political parties were all 
 split up, there being four presidential candi- 
 dates in the field : Douglas, Democrat ; Breckin- 
 ridge, Southern Democrat ; Lincoln, Black Re- 
 publican; and Bell, Old Line Whig. Douglas 
 made a stirring appeal at Newport while the 
 Association was in session, and I went to hear 
 him. 
 
 I returned to Columbia in September, Lin- 
 178 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 coin was elected in November, and then the 
 storm burst; first, the secession of South Caro- 
 lina, then of other States, then the dreadful war 
 between the North and South. At first I was 
 extremely reluctant to join in, and was even op- 
 posed to the secession movement ; I doubted its 
 necessity and dreaded the impending conflict 
 and its result. A large number of the best and 
 most thoughtful men all over tho South felt as 
 I did ; but gradually a change came about — how, 
 who can say? It was in the atmosphere; we 
 breathed it in the air; it reverberated from 
 heart to heart; it was like a spiritual conta- 
 gion — good or bad, who could say? But the 
 final result was enthusiastic unanimity of senti- 
 ment throughout the South. Those who were 
 latest and most reluctant, because they saw the 
 seriousness of the result, were also the most 
 earnest and most reliable. Those who did not 
 join in the movement were, with a very few ex- 
 ceptions, like James L. Petigru, untrue men in 
 every way, North and South alike. " Copper- 
 heads " and " skalawags " were, with few excep- 
 tions, alike false. I spoke of Mr. Petigru as an 
 exception. From the first and throughout the 
 war he was a Union man, speaking openly and 
 never concepding his opposition to secession. 
 
 179 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 He said the State, which he loved dearly, was 
 demented, rushing on ruin; but submitted 
 quietly and sorrowfully. Every one respected 
 his views and such was the confidence in his in- 
 tegrity that after the war the State gave him 
 the work of codifying the laws. 
 
 The Secession Convention, which sat in 
 Columbia in December, 1860, was the gravest, 
 ablest, and most dignified body of men I ever 
 saw brought together. They were fully aware 
 of the extreme gravity of their action. While 
 the Convention was in session smallpox broke 
 out in Columbia, so the deliberations were con- 
 tinued in Charleston and the secession decree 
 signed there. Then followed in quick succes- 
 sion the secession of Georgia, Alabama, Missis- 
 sippi, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas ; then the 
 creation of a national government, with its cap- 
 ital at Montgomery, Alabama; then the seces- 
 sion of Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and 
 Arkansas ; and finally the removal of the capital 
 to Richmond, Virginia. 
 
 This secession movement was first called an 
 insurrection, and later a rebellion; and the war 
 which followed is commonly spoken of in history 
 as " the War of the Rebellion." Nothing can 
 be more absurd. The Confederate States coni- 
 
 180 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 posed a thoroughly organized government, as 
 much so as the United States. During the 
 whole war the machinery of government was 
 practically perfect. It was a war between the 
 States, or better still, a war between two nations. 
 For each side it was really a foreign war. I am 
 not speaking of the merits of the case, but only 
 of acknowledged facts. I am not blaming any- 
 body on either side. It was evidently an hon- 
 est difference of opinion as to the nature of our 
 government ; it was honestly fought out to a fin- 
 ish and the result frankly accepted. But let it 
 be distinctly understood, that there never was 
 a war in which were more thoroughly enlisted 
 the hearts of the whole people — men, women, 
 and children — than were those of the South in 
 this. To us it was literally a life and death 
 struggle for national existence ; and doubtless 
 the feeling was equally honest and earnest on 
 the other side. 
 
 I shall not speak in detail of the course of 
 the war, for that belongs to history; but shall 
 speak only of my personal experiences during 
 the conflict. The College went on quietly dur- 
 ing 1860 and 1861. In the spring of '61 there 
 was the siege of Fort Sumter by our forces and 
 the firing on the United States vessel bringing 
 
 181 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 supplies to the beleaguered fort. Instantly the 
 whole country was ablaze; troops were called 
 out by Lincoln, and the war was actually on. A 
 large number of students left the College to 
 join our forces, but still we went on with dimin- 
 ished numbers. In the spring of '62 the stress 
 of war became greater and the number of our 
 students was reduced to forty or fifty, but still 
 the College continued. In June, 1862, came the 
 terrible seven days' battle for the possession of 
 Richmond and the call for all men over eighteen, 
 and the College was perforce disbanded, for all 
 the students volunteered. 
 
 Edwin Nisbet, Mrs. Le Conte's brother, was 
 in the battles about Richmond, and lay desper- 
 ately sick of typhoid fever there. We there- 
 fore went on to nurse him. The condition of 
 the city and the surrounding country after the 
 battles was awful. There were twenty-five 
 thousand sick and wounded in the hospitals in 
 the city and many more in the hospital camps 
 in the vicinity. The blessedness of surgery 
 and the nobleness of surgeons were well shown 
 here ; the sick and wounded were of both armies, 
 and the surgeons of both sides worked together 
 in the alleviation of pain and the cure of disease. 
 I visited the hospital camp at Savage Station, 
 
 182 
 
IN TIME OP WAR 
 
 and found the condition of affairs horrible. 
 All the buildings were utilized and tents added, 
 but still there was not sufficient room and hun- 
 dreds of sick and dying lay under the trees. 
 For want of sufficient nurses, neglect was un- 
 avoidable. I myself took the typhoid in Rich- 
 mond and was sick three weeks. In the mean- 
 time Edwin recovered and we went back to 
 Columbia together. 
 
 Though our salaries at the College con- 
 tinued, as we were State officers, they were 
 dreadfully insufficient on account of the depre- 
 ciation of the currency, and I found it necessary 
 to supplement mine. In October, 1862, I was 
 appointed one of three arbitrators in an action 
 brought to decide the right of the Confederate 
 Government to the possession of the niter caves. 
 I went to Atlanta and heard arguments by the 
 best lawyers for three weeks, rendered my de- 
 cision, and then returned to Columbia. During 
 these dark days of the war I wrote some of the 
 papers already named. One of them, The 
 Nature and Uses of the Fine Arts, which I con- 
 sider one of my best, was written in 1863, when 
 the whole South was in an agony of conflict. 
 The College was suspended; I must do some- 
 thing ; I thought and wrote. Finally this would 
 
 183 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 not answer. I felt that I must do something in 
 support of the cause that absorbed every feel- 
 ing. Just as I was asking myself how I could 
 turn my scientific knowledge to some useful ac- 
 count, a large manufactory of medicines for the 
 army was established in the suburbs of Colum- 
 bia, and I was asked to be the chemist. I ac- 
 cepted, and for about eighteen months was en- 
 gaged in the manufacture on a large scale of 
 many kinds of medicine, alcohol, nitrate of sil- 
 ver, chloroform, sulfuric ether, nitric ether, 
 podophyllin, etc. The whole army was sup- 
 plied by this laboratory with all medicines, ex- 
 cept those that could be had more easily by run- 
 ning the blockade. 
 
 In 1864, without solicitation on my part, I 
 was appointed chemist of the Niter and Min- 
 ing Bureau, with the rank and pay of major. 
 My business was to test all nitrous earth, 
 whether from caves or niter beds. My labora- 
 tory was that of the College, and I was given 
 an accomplished analyst as assistant. In the 
 summer I visited all the niter caves in northern 
 Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee, all the niter 
 beds in South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, 
 and the iron mines and blast-furnace at Shelby- 
 ville, Alabama. Here I also found a Bessemer 
 
 184 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 furnace, the first I had ever seen and the only 
 one in the Confederacy. In September I re- 
 turned to Columbia and prepared my report to 
 St. John, the Chief of the Bureau, in Richmond. 
 Meanwhile Sherman was coming down from 
 Chattanooga toward Atlanta, Johnston slowly 
 retreating before him but contesting every foot 
 of the way. Then Atlanta was taken and John- 
 ston superseded by Hood, a great blunder. 
 Then we heard that Hood had gone around to 
 Sherman's rear and invaded Tennessee, leaving 
 the door open to the south for Sherman to 
 march through Georgia from the mountains to 
 the sea, an easy thing to do, since there was no 
 force to oppose him. Next we heard that 
 Hood's army had been met and shattered by 
 Thomas and that the remnants were hastening 
 to South Carolina again to get in front of Sher- 
 man. In the meantime his army was nearing 
 Savannah and would certainly ravage the whole 
 coast. My widowed sister, her two girls, and 
 my own fourteen-year-old daughter were at 
 Halifax, my sister's plantation, some thirty-five 
 miles south of Savannah, with no one to protect 
 them but faithful negroes* I hastened to their 
 rescue, leaving Columbia on the ninth of De- 
 cember. 
 
 185 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 Within ten miles of Savannah the train came 
 to a standstill, and we learned that the bridge 
 over the Savannah River was already in the 
 hands of the enemy and partially burned. 
 Though within forty-five miles of my destina- 
 tion, I had to return to Columbia, therefore, and 
 try to reach Liberty from the south by a dCtour 
 of eight hundred and fifty miles. After many 
 unpleasant experiences, particularly because of 
 the lack o'f food and sleep, and some real dan- 
 ger, the train being shelled by the enemy, I 
 reached Columbia again five days after my de- 
 parture. 
 
 Three days later I set out once more, going 
 by rail to Mayfield and thence, as the railroads 
 in Georgia had been torn up in Sherman's 
 Grand March, by the wagon road to Macon. 
 From Macon I went by rail and stage to 
 Thomasville, traveling ail night and suffering 
 intensely from the cold. This town fairly 
 swarmed with refugees, from whom I learned 
 that the Yankees had already been in Liberty 
 and wantonly destroyed the stock and crops. 
 My sister, I was informed, was probably still 
 in her home, so on the twenty-fourth I went on 
 to Doctortown, the extreme outpost of the Con- 
 federate forces in that quarter and but twenty- 
 
 186 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 six miles from Halifax. As Liberty still 
 swarmed with Yankees, I determined to remain 
 quietly in Doctortown till I could get word to 
 my sister by scouts. 
 
 Christmas opened bright and beautiful, but 
 was a very anxious day for me. One of my 
 own negroes arrived and told me that all the 
 animals on my place had been killed and much 
 of the corn and rice carried off or destroyed. 
 Later in the day I met a negro who, having 
 guided his master to safety, was about to return 
 to Liberty, and by him I sent a letter to my 
 sister entreating her to come to me with the 
 girls. 
 
 I remained in camp at Doctortown a whole 
 week in enforced inactivity. On the twenty- . 
 seventh I received a letter from my sister say- 
 ing that as there was not a horse or vehicle left 
 in the whole county she had no means of com- ; 
 ing to me, and begging me by no means to at- 
 tempt to come to her, as the Yankees were still 
 numerous in the vicinity of her house. In this 
 dilemma the general who was in command of 
 the camp consented to send out a party with a 
 flag of truce to represent to the enemy the pain- 
 ful position of the ladies and to ask their help 
 in removing all who desired to leave. The 
 
 187 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 squad returned with the word that they had 
 seen no Yankees, so Major Camp, Captain 
 Varnedoe, and I immediately began prepara- 
 tions to bring out our friends. I decided to go 
 ahead and prepare them for the coming of the 
 wagons, and started off on New Year's day with 
 a bounding step, a light heart, and joyous an- 
 ticipations of soon meeting my loved ones and 
 rescuing them from the scenes of desolation and 
 the dread of further violence. The task I had 
 undertaken was no light one, for, except the 
 bridge across the Altamaha Elver, all the 
 bridges and trestles over the many swamps had 
 been burned. But I laughed to scorn all diffi- 
 culties, provided myself with passports, and was 
 soon beyond the pickets. 
 
 At the lake, an old slough or river-bed 
 partly silted up, I met a friend who told me that 
 the Yankees had by no means left the county; 
 that he himself had been dodging them in the 
 woods for a fortnight, escaping only " by the 
 skin of his teeth." The news somewhat stag- 
 gered me, but I determined to go on at any risk, 
 but with extreme caution. 
 
 Late in the afternoon I reached Walthour- 
 ville and found the village deserted and the 
 homes of many of my friends but blackened 
 
 188 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 ruins. Only one man, Mr. Cay, was still in his 
 home and he warmly invited me to share his 
 supper and bed. At daybreak next morning I 
 started again and by nine o'clock had reached 
 my sister's house. I approached it unobserved 
 and knocked sharply. After a few minutes the 
 door was opened by the old negro house-serv- 
 ant, who on recognizing me uttered a wild 
 scream, seized me by both hands, and dragged 
 me, she screaming and I laughing, up-stairs to 
 her mistress' room. In a moment I held my 
 loved ones in my arms. Then followed the sad 
 recital of their sufferings and losses. Every 
 day for nearly two weeks the Yankees had en- 
 tered their house, each separate gang ransack- 
 ing every room and taking whatever they de- 
 sired. I told them my reasons for believing 
 that they had left the county but would soon re- 
 turn, and urged them to prepare for immediate 
 departure. The young ladies were eager to go 
 at once; but as my sister had much to pack, it 
 was arranged that I should return for her. 
 About eight o'clock in the evening I received 
 word from Captain Varnedoe that the wagons 
 were hidden in a swamp about a mile and a half 
 from us, but that, as the Yankees were certainly 
 returning, if they had not already returned, it 
 
 189 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 would be necessary for us to lie perdue for a 
 while, or to turn back and escape. 
 
 As it was clearly impossible to go out by 
 wagon, I determined to take my daughter to 
 Doctortown on horseback, one of the negroes 
 having offered to lend me an old, broken-down 
 horse that the Yankees had abandoned. At day- 
 break on the third, after a sad, sad good-by and 
 a solemn promise to return for the others as 
 soon as possible, we started, Sallie on the old 
 horse and my man Joshua and I on foot. As 
 we entered the main road to Walthourville we 
 heard shots about half a mile to the north that 
 showed that the Yankees were approaching Hali- 
 fax. It was indeed a narrow escape. About 
 sunrise a neighbor ran out from his house to say 
 that it was simple madness to go on, that the 
 Yankees had been at Walthourville the night 
 before and would probably come down that very 
 road. As they were certainly in possession of 
 the road behind us, I decided to push on, how- 
 ever, but with more caution, keeping a sharp 
 lookout for hiding-places. 
 
 About nine o'clock we approached Walthour- 
 ville, and having sent Joshua ahead to recon- 
 noiter, Sallie and I turned aside into a thickly 
 wooded branch road and sat down to rest. We 
 
 190 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 had not been hidden more than ten minutes when 
 we realized that the Yankees were encamped in 
 the woods not over fifty yards from us. They 
 were evidently breaking camp, and in a few min- 
 utes came galloping by. If our Rosinante had 
 had the least spark of spirit, had he neighed 
 once in answer to the snorting of the horses, we 
 should have been lost; but he didn't even prick 
 up his ears, having evidently seen enough of 
 that sort of thing. 
 
 All day long horsemen went galloping and 
 wagons rumbling by within fifty yards of where 
 we sat concealed. About four o'clock, the gal- 
 loping having in a measure ceased, I crept on 
 my hands and knees to the road and examined 
 the tracks. To my dismay and intense disap- 
 pointment I found that a considerable number 
 led up the road toward Doctortown. The con- 
 viction was forced upon me that we could not go 
 on. About sunset Joshua returned, and he 
 agreed with me that we should have to turn back. 
 Soon after dark, therefore, we sadly and cau- 
 tiously started on our return, and by nine o'clock 
 were again at Halifax. The Yankees had told 
 my sister that on the sixth they would leave the 
 county and not return, so I decided to hide in 
 the woods until their departure and then take 
 
 191 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 my friends out. But I was so worn out by my 
 eighteen-mile walk and the constant suspense 
 and anxiety that this night I determined to sleep 
 in the house, though several thousand Yankees 
 were encamped only three or four hundred 
 yards distant. 
 
 I learned in the morning that three of the 
 negroes, fearing that the Yankees might have 
 heard of my being in the house, had patrolled 
 the roads all night while I peacefully slept. 
 The same faithful and affectionate fellows be- 
 fore daybreak conducted me to the hiding-place 
 they had selected, a dry spot in the midst of a 
 strip of thick, swampy ground surrounded by a 
 ten-foot canal. They made a comfortable bed 
 of Spanish moss, spread over it a blanket, and 
 left me to my meditations. Soon the Yankees 
 were swarming in the fields on both sides of me, 
 popping at everything they could see; but I 
 became so absorbed in one of James's novels, 
 with which I had been provided, that I entirely 
 forgot their presence save when they came ex- 
 ceptionally near. At night I again alept in the 
 house, but as it was evident from questions they 
 had asked that the Yankees had some inkling 
 of my presence, only partially undressed and 
 was ready for immediate flight. 
 
 192 
 
IN TIME OF WAS 
 
 The following day was passed as the previ- 
 ous one had been. On returning to the house 
 at night I noticed several fires in the distance 
 and learned that the Yankees were burning 
 houses, a sign, the negroes told me, that they 
 would leave on the morrow. About noon of the 
 sixth, therefore, as all appeared to have gone, I 
 again prepared to leave with my daughter. In 
 the midst of the preparations, however, a picket 
 ran in to say that a party of Yankees was ap- 
 proaching, and I immediately darted through 
 the cluster of negro houses and hid in the gall- 
 bushes behind. The party soon rode on, but 
 the incident convinced me that it was not yet 
 safe to attempt to go out, so I returned to my 
 hiding-place in the swamp. 
 
 The next day one of the negroes came with 
 the word that a party had come from Doctor- 
 town under a flag of truce with wagons for car- 
 rying out the ladies. As, however, all could not 
 be accommodated, my sister decided to remain 
 until I could return for her. About noon they 
 started, nine ladies, their children and servants. 
 It was a strange, sad, and never-to-be-forgotten 
 sight; so many ladies, nurtured in tenderness 
 and plenty, never knowing want or even hard- 
 ship, now driven from their homes, they hardly 
 14 193 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 knew whither. And yet so great had been the 
 distress of mind and even terror for the previ- 
 ous three weeks that on leaving they were in 
 the highest spirits. 
 
 After visiting my own plantation and giving 
 the overseer directions, I returned to Halifax 
 and walked thence to Walthourville, overtaking 
 the ladies there. Next morning I walked to 
 Doctortown to prepare for their recejotion, and 
 by two o'clock all were safe there. The day 
 after I took my own party on the cars to 
 Thomas ville, and from there sent them by 
 wagon in charge of a friend to Macon, while I 
 returned to Doctortown to arrange for bringing 
 out my sister and her baggage. 
 
 On the walk from Doctortown to Halifax I 
 found to my dismay that the waters of the Back- 
 swamp were far more swollen than I had previ- 
 ously seen them, so that I had to wade for over 
 half a mile in water more than waist-deep and 
 against a strong current. 
 
 From Halifax I went over to my own place 
 and had a talk with the negroes. As they stood 
 bareheaded in a semicircle about me, I told 
 them that if they desired to go with me, I would 
 make some kind of provision for them, if it took 
 my last dollar, though just how I could provide 
 
 194 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 for them I did not know ; if, however, they pre- 
 ferred remaining on the plantation, there was 
 plenty of corn and rice but no meat, as all of my 
 stock had been destroyed. With one accord 
 they replied that if I had a place on which to 
 put them, where they would not again be dis- 
 turbed by Yankees, and provisions and meat for 
 them, they would go willingly; but that they 
 preferred remaining where they were to being 
 carried they knew not whither. I told them that 
 I thought they had decided wisely and spoke to 
 tEem of the necessity not only of work but of or- 
 ganized work and hence of a head to direct. 
 They expressed their willingness to work as 
 they always had done if / would take charge and 
 direct, but said that they could not get along 
 with the overseer, seeming to think in fact that 
 their day of deliverance from overseers had 
 come. I told them that it was impossible for 
 me to remain, but that my uncle, William Jones, 
 would direct their labor, and to this they cheer- 
 fully consented. One by one they then came 
 forward and shook hands with me and with 
 many expressions of kindness and affection 
 bade me good-by. It was impossible to doubt 
 the faithfulness of the negroes generally. At 
 least a hundred knew of my hiding-place in the 
 
 195 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 swamp near rny sister's house, but none betrayed 
 me. 
 
 About four o'clock we left Halifax for Wal- 
 thourville. My sister went out with the 
 wagons; but she had so much baggage that it 
 was impossible to take it all, so with the help of 
 one of the negroes I attempted to take out four 
 large trunks by means of an old cart and the 
 broken-down Yankee horse previously men- 
 tioned. About sunset our troubles began, for 
 the cart stalled so often in the thick blue mud of 
 the causeway that we were three full hours in 
 going half a mile. Half a dozen times Henry 
 and I had to carry the heavy trunks, two of 
 which weighed over three hundred pounds 
 apiece, to firmer ground before we could draw 
 the cart from the mud. The old horse was so 
 strained as to be unfit for service and a mile 
 from Walthourville absolutely refused to go 
 farther. We were obliged, therefore, to pass 
 the night in a negro cabin by the roadside. 
 
 As it seemed impossible that the old horse 
 could take us to Doctortown, I left the cart in 
 the care of Henry and went ahead to get a good 
 strong mule. Hearing of a ferry across the 
 Backswamp, I went to it to avoid wading again, 
 and after some delay got a place as passenger 
 
 196 
 
IN TIME OF WAE 
 
 in a small canoe with a cask of molasses as 
 freight and a negro as engineer. But as the 
 negro stepped in he tilted the canoe a little and 
 the cask, not being properly secured, rolled to 
 one side. In an instant the whole contents of 
 the canoe, human and saccharine, were spilt 
 into the water. As it would take some time to 
 raise and bail the canoe and as I was thor- 
 oughly wet already, I decided to wade across, 
 went to the trestle, and in pitch darkness 
 plunged half a mile through water waist-deep. 
 
 Having selected from the sorry lot at Doctor- 
 town a mule that proved to be more trouble 
 than he was worth, I started next morning 
 to return for the cart. At the Backs wamp my 
 trouble began. Finding a cart going across, I 
 sat in the back and endeavored to lead the mule 
 over. The horse in the cart plunged along 
 rapidly and unequally; the mule was unwilling 
 to lead, I was unwilling to let go, the rope was 
 unwilling to break: the result of this concate- 
 nation of unwillingness was that I was pulled 
 out of the cart into water nearly up to my neck ! 
 Arrived at the other side, we proceeded to the 
 railroad. Now / preferred going along the 
 track ; but the mule had a different opinion, and, 
 after some vigorous argument to no effect, rea- 
 
 197 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 son was obliged to yield to obstinacy and we 
 took the wagon road, though it was nearly twice 
 as long. The result was that we reached Henry 
 and the trunks too late to return to Doctortown 
 that day. 
 
 The old horse was so rested by the next 
 morning that I determined to use him in the 
 cart after all and to ride the mule. All went 
 well until we reached the fatal Backswamp. 
 "We carried the trunks over one by one in the 
 canoe; then Henry drove over the empty cart 
 while I swam the mule behind the canoe. But 
 within ten steps of the farther side the old 
 horse stumbled and fell and would inevitably 
 have drowned had not Henry and I leaped into 
 the water and released him from the cart. By 
 nightfall, however, we had the trunks under a 
 shed three-quarters of a mile from the ferry, 
 and I went on to Doctortown to sleep. 
 
 On returning to the shed next morning I 
 found there Colonel Hood, who had had charge 
 of the wagons that were bringing the ladies out. 
 He said that they were on the other side of the 
 Backswamp, and as the rain was falling in tor- 
 rents, he transferred the task of getting them 
 across to me with evident pleasure. To get the 
 entire party over I had to make the trip by 
 
 198 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 canoe nine or ten times in the blinding rain and 
 against a swift current, but by one o'clock all 
 were safe in Doctortown. 
 
 But my troubles were not yet at an end, for 
 the baggage had to be transferred from the 
 shed to the camp. Having got most of it to the 
 Altamaha bridge by noon next day, a friend and 
 I endeavored to take all that was left across the 
 lake in a single boat-load. All went well and 
 we decided to pole along the upper side of the 
 embankment to the bridge. But the great flood 
 of water that ran with fury through the trestles 
 made the passage by them with our heavily-laden 
 boat really dangerous. The first trestle we 
 passed with great difficulty, breaking two oars 
 and narrowly escaping being swept through; 
 but no human power could withstand the fury 
 of the torrent rushing through the next. We 
 were dashed violently against the uprights, car- 
 ried through, and whirled around with a velocity 
 that in spite of our efforts took us into the 
 swampy woods on the lower side with great risk 
 of overturning or smashing the boat. To pro- 
 ceed on our way it was necessary for us to re- 
 turn through the trestle. But how? 
 
 Landing on the embankment I ran back to 
 where I had seen a canoe, stripped a hundred 
 
 199 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 feet or so of broken telegraph wire from the 
 poles standing in the water, and paddled back 
 to the boat. We then fastened the wire to the 
 bow and with five negroes on shore hauling on 
 it and my companion and I sometimes rowing, 
 sometimes pushing on the piers of the trestle, 
 succeeded after half an hour's severe struggle 
 in forcing the boat through the trestle against a 
 roaring torrent that rose almost to the gunwale 
 and threatened every moment to swamp us. 
 Having rounded the point, we were in compara- 
 tively smooth water, and soon had the last piece 
 of baggage at the bridge, whence it was con- 
 veyed to Doctortown in a box-car that I had 
 chartered. 
 
 From Doctortown we went without difficulty 
 by rail to Thomas ville, but there our troubles 
 began again. It took me two days to secure a 
 couple of wagons to carry us to Albany, and 
 for the sixty-mile trip I had to pay four hun- 
 dred dollars. The roads were in such dread- 
 ful condition that we were four days on the 
 way. We were obliged to camp out one night, 
 and as it was intensely cold and very windy 
 suffered severely on the trip. On the thirtieth 
 of January, having journeyed from Albany 
 by rail, we reached Macon, and found the rest 
 
 200 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 of our party safe at the home of one of my 
 nieces. 
 
 After a day spent in resting and visiting 
 friends, we started for Milledgeville. "We were 
 delayed by our baggage and reached the station 
 just as the cars were moving off. A young man 
 in Confederate gray, seeing our predicament, 
 ran to the conductor, stopped the train, and 
 helped the ladies on, while I attended to the bag- 
 gage. A mile and a half from Milledgeville we 
 had to alight, as the rails beyond that had been 
 torn up by Sherman. Here there was a perfect 
 Babel, travelers being anxious to proceed and 
 wagoners taking advantage of their necessities 
 to practise extortion. I found the prices 
 charged too exorbitant for my dwindling purse 
 and was in a quandary when the same young 
 soldier again came to our relief and quickly en- 
 gaged two wagons at half the price that had 
 been asked me. Henceforward he was regu- 
 larly installed as a member of our party. 
 
 He was a rather good-looking young fellow, 
 bright, quick, and efficient, but quiet and unob- 
 trusive. Though but twenty, according to his 
 own statement, he had evidently seen much of 
 the world, and pretended to be a great reader 
 of character. Ready-witted, keenly observant, 
 
 201 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and apparently open and frank, there was, how- 
 ever, something mysterious about him, and he 
 both attracted and repelled. He knew all the 
 officers of the army that we met and they all 
 knew him. He was acquainted with the minut- 
 est details concerning our army, but seemed no 
 less conversant with Sherman's. My sister 
 thought him a Yankee spy, but he himself said 
 he was a Confederate, a member of Lewis's Ken- 
 tucky brigade, who had fought the Yankees all 
 through Georgia with Wheeler. He called him- 
 self Davis, but promised some time to tell us his 
 real name. Whatever he was, he had evidently 
 taken a great liking to our party and was very 
 kind and efficient, beguiling the tedium of the 
 ride to Mayfield with incessant, bright conver- 
 sation. He told the most awful stories of his 
 adventures, but seemed capable of doing all that 
 he related. As we parted from him at Augusta, 
 he said, " I shall soon see you again in Colum- 
 bia. The Yankees are certainly going there, 
 and I shall be wherever they are." 
 
 From Augusta we had intended going to 
 Columbia by rail, but alas! Sherman was 
 ahead of me again, and all of the cars had been 
 impressed to carry Stovall's brigade to the 
 scene of an expected battle. Fortunately I 
 
 202 
 
IN TIME OF WAR 
 
 found in town Professor Holmes, the Superin- 
 tendent of the Niter and Mining Bureau, with 
 which I was connected, and he, having arranged 
 to have our baggage forwarded by government 
 wagons, drove us to Edgefield, his home, and 
 thence, after hospitably; entertaining us, to 
 Columbia. 
 
 203 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 A FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 At last, after an absence of nearly two 
 months, I again reached home. But the inde- 
 fatigable Sherman was close by, and I knew not 
 how soon I might be compelled to run. The 
 next week was an anxious one for all of us, and 
 its memory is burned into my brain. The 
 enemy, swearing vengeance against South 
 Carolina, the cradle of secession, approached 
 step by step; consternation and panic flight of 
 women and children in front and a blackened 
 ruin behind. Three days after my return I re- 
 ceived orders from Richmond to remove the 
 chemical laboratory to that place, and after sev- 
 eral days' hard work packing shipped the boxes 
 by rail on the fifteenth of February. The depot 
 was crowded with people trying to get away, 
 women and children pleading to be taken aboard 
 the cars. The panic was really frightful, but 
 still I strove to remain calm, for, though both 
 
 204 
 
FUGITIVE BEFOEE SHERMAN'S AEMY 
 
 our first and second lines of defense had been 
 carried and the booming of the enemy's guns 
 sounded ever nearer and nearer, the authorities 
 confidently said there was no real danger — Har- 
 dee's army corps would surely come in time. 
 But on my way home that night I met a wagon- 
 train fully half a mile long, rumbling slowly 
 and softly through the silent and deserted 
 streets toward the Charlotte depot, as if steal- 
 ing away in the dark. It was evidently an army- 
 train, and the solemn rumbling as it dragged its 
 slow length along smote painfully on my heart. 
 For the first time my hopes utterly gave way, 
 and I thought, Columbia is doomed ! 
 
 On reaching home I found Mr. Davis, true 
 to his promise, anxiously awaiting me. He 
 urged me to flee at once, as the Yankees might 
 be in the city on the morrow, asserting that he 
 had been in their camp all day and knew all 
 their plans. On being asked what he thought 
 would be the fate of the city if it fell into their 
 hands, he said that he feared to tell us what he 
 knew would take place, but that he thought that 
 he could save my house and my brother's. He 
 claimed to have great influence with Yankee offi- 
 cers by means of bribery and offered to give me 
 letters to Yankee colonels, to be used if neces- 
 
 205 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 sary ; but I declined his offer, as I did not wish 
 to be connected with any tortuous policy. 
 " You must not be surprised," he said, " in case 
 any Yankees enter your house to see me among 
 them. If you recognize me, don't betray me." 
 
 Full of these sad tidings, I went to see my 
 brother John, and found him and Captain Ash- 
 bell Green consulting about leaving at once. 
 The military authorities had at last confessed 
 that they could not hold Columbia, and had ad- 
 vised them to save what Niter Bureau stores 
 they could. We decided to go as soon as possi- 
 ble. By Mr. Davis's advice we packed all our 
 valuables, manuscripts, lecture-notes, etc., and 
 sent them to the Niter Bureau to go out with 
 the stores, and then took a sad, heart-breaking 
 leave of our families, commending them to the 
 tender mercy of God, our common Father. 
 
 That was the saddest night of my life. Our 
 imperative duty was to save, if possible, the 
 government property in our care, and it would 
 have been worse than useless for us to have re- 
 mained, for as we were all officers, we should 
 certainly have been taken prisoners. And yet 
 it was hard to leave in the hands of the enemy 
 all that we loved most tenderly. I worked all 
 night packing, the ominous words of Mr. Davis, 
 
 206 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 " I fear to tell yon what scenes will be enacted 
 in Columbia," ringing in my ears, and the sol- 
 emn booming of Sherman's gnns giving them 
 fearful meaning and emphasis. 
 
 About six o'clock on the morning of the six- 
 teenth we started, Captain Green, John, his son 
 Johnny, and I, with twenty-two negroes, includ- 
 ing the wives and children of those who had 
 been working on the niter plantation, a sad en- 
 cumbrance. "We had two wagons, two carts, and 
 a buggy, all heavily loaded. Our intention was 
 to go to Allston, but owing to our taking the 
 wrong road and stalling in the thick mud, we 
 made camp the first night not more than ten 
 miles in a direct line from Columbia. 
 
 About three o'clock the next morning we 
 were awakened by a terrific explosion that shook 
 the ground like an earthquake. We were in 
 great anxiety to know what it meant and Mr. 
 Davis's words haunted my memory. Later we 
 learned that a large quantity of powder in the 
 Charleston depot had been ignited by the care- 
 less use of lights by a band of plunderers, many 
 of whom were killed by the explosion. 
 
 By sunrise we were on our way again. On 
 coming into the direct road to Allston we found 
 it full of fugitives from Columbia, panic- 
 
 207 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 stricken, wayworn, and travel-stained, but still 
 hurrying on. From them we learned that after 
 traveling a day and a half we were but twelve 
 or thirteen miles from the city. We stopped 
 for the night at a deserted house by the way- 
 side, and about ten o'clock, with an ejaculated 
 prayer for the loved ones at home, I threw my- 
 self on a pile of fodder and was soon asleep. 
 Alas ! alas ! while we thus slept in peace Colum- 
 bia was wrapped in flames. Had we glanced in 
 that direction we should have seen the ruddy 
 glare and slept no more that night. 
 
 The next morning we continued creeping 
 along the awful roads at the rate of about two 
 miles an hour. I was walking ahead, of the 
 wagons, enjoying the glorious morning, when 
 suddenly a country woman ran from a cabin a 
 hundred yards from the road and called to me 
 to stop. 
 
 "Where are you going? " she asked. 
 
 "To Allston." 
 
 " To Allston ! Don't you know the Yankees 
 are crossing the Broad River not a mile from 
 here?" 
 
 " Impossible ! We met Wheeler's men not 
 more than a mile or two back and they as- 
 sured us there were no Yankees ahead. They 
 
 208 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 ought to know, for they were sent here to watch 
 them." 
 
 " Wheeler's men ! " she retorted contemptu- 
 ously; "don't you see that smoke yonder? and 
 that there! And yonder! And again yon- 
 der!" 
 
 I looked as she pointed and to my utter dis- 
 may realized that we were indeed in the midst 
 of the enemy, whom we thought so far away. 
 "We at once determined to turn into the woods 
 and remain hidden until they had passed by. 
 The chance of escape was small, but to go on or 
 to turn back was certain capture. Having taken 
 down the fence, therefore, we drove the wagons 
 deep into the forest and concealed them in a lit- 
 tle grove of saplings, replaced the fence, and 
 carefully erased the wagon tracks from the road 
 to the wood. After we had made a camp in 
 a little hollow through which ran a stream, Cap- 
 tain Green and I returned to the road to observe 
 the enemy. We soon saw seven Yankee soldiers 
 approach a house on the main road, about three 
 hundred yards from where we were concealed, 
 and erelong heard the popping of Yankee guns 
 and the squealing of Confederate pigs and the 
 squawking of rebel chickens. About eleven a 
 dense column of smoke arose from another 
 15 209 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 house not over a hundred yards from us. A 
 few minutes later several companies passed on 
 the road within twenty yards of us and turned 
 up a branch road that skirted the wood, and 
 soon two columns of smoke to the northward 
 told that two more houses had been fired. As 
 other companies continued to pass on the main 
 road, our position was becoming dangerous, so 
 I returned to camp and reported to John what I 
 had seen. I then crept on hands and knees 
 toward the houses burning on the north. The 
 hum of many voices approaching caused me to 
 lie very close, and within thirty steps of me 
 passed two companies of soldiers leading half 
 a dozen horses and mules from the burning 
 stables. 
 
 Though I prowled around during the after- 
 noon I saw no Yankees, and we began to hope 
 that they had passed on. About sunset, how- 
 ever, they began to return and soon after dark 
 we saw their fires on the Broad River, about a 
 mile away, and heard the rolling of their drums 
 and the cheering as party after party returned 
 laden with booty ; and knew that their camp had 
 not been moved. We had been too anxious to 
 think about eating, but as the negro children 
 were clamorous for food, we consented with 
 
 210 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 many misgivings to the making of a fire for 
 cooking. We concealed it as much as possible, 
 but the reflection on the tree-tops was fearfully 
 distinct, so we extinguished it as soon as we 
 could and went quietly to bed. 
 
 We were in fine spirits next morning, for we 
 erroneously thought that we had escaped dis- 
 covery. Just after breakfast we heard the 
 measured tramp, tramp of inarching troops, 
 and saw a regiment pass along the road within 
 a hundred and fifty yards of us. We drew a 
 long breath when they were fairly by. But a 
 few moments later a sharp cry of " Look out ! " 
 broke the stillness of the early morning air. 
 Recognizing the voice of Captain Green, who 
 was doing picket duty while we breakfasted, I 
 immediately ran to the wagons where I had 
 carelessly left my pistol and a valise containing 
 money, jewelry, railroad bonds, manuscripts, 
 and other valuables. But alas ! when I reached 
 one wagon I saw the Yankees already swarm- 
 ing upon and pillaging the other. I was within 
 ten steps of them before I saw them and had no 
 time to save anything. I dropped to my hands 
 and knees, crept into the thicket, and at a dis- 
 tance of thirty yards watched them knock to 
 pieces trunks and boxes and rifle their contents. 
 
 211 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 As some were scattering about, evidently 
 searching for hiding Confederates, I gradually 
 shifted my position, and finally concealed my- 
 self in a clump of saplings on the other side of 
 the by-road. Here I lay listening to the work 
 of destruction for more than an hour. 
 
 The clump of saplings was, however, so 
 small and so near the road, along which the 
 enemy was passing continually, that I was in 
 imminent danger of discovery. Once indeed a 
 tall Yankee (he seemed to me enormously tall!) 
 came straight toward me, but he stopped when 
 but six feet away, laid down his gun, adjusted 
 his haversack and canteen, and passed on. I de- 
 termined, if possible, to recross the road and 
 regain the main wood, and after several futile 
 attempts succeeded about noon in doing so. I 
 crept cautiously toward the wagons to learn the 
 fate of the others and to save my manuscripts 
 if possible; but when about thirty yards from 
 camp was brought to a halt by the voices of 
 Yankees and negroes, the latter raised in ex- 
 postulation. Cautiously creeping nearer I saw 
 the soldiers, evidently a second party, pile the 
 trunks and boxes on the wagons, set fire to them, 
 and watch them burn to ashes. Then they be- 
 gan to search the woods and I again had to fly 
 
 212 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 and seek concealment. Bat my extreme anxiety 
 concerning my brother and nephew made it im- 
 possible for me to keep quiet, and several times 
 during the afternoon I crept down to camp. 
 But each time I found Yankees there and had 
 to retreat. My anxiety became insupportable. 
 May I never again pass such a day of agony! 
 
 After dark, seeing the camp-fire burning, I 
 determined at any risk to make another attempt. 
 This time there was no one there but the 
 negroes, who seemed unfeignedly glad to see 
 me safe. John, they said, had given himself up 
 to the enemy, apparently recognizing the fu- 
 tility of trying to escape with his son, who was 
 just convalescing from a serious illness. Cap- 
 tain Green they believed to be still in hiding in 
 the woods. Party after party had been search- 
 ing for us, for they knew that two of us had 
 escaped and even mentioned our names. After 
 eating some food and warming myself, I retired 
 from the bright light of the fire, and a little later 
 word was brought to me that Captain Green had 
 come to the camp. I immediately went forward 
 and in a moment was clasping his hand. The 
 poor fellow was very much exhausted, having 
 had almost no sleep the previous night and 
 nothing to eat since supper the previous day. 
 
 213 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 He had lain hidden all day in the clump of sap- 
 lings across the road in which I myself had 
 sought shelter, and had narrowly escaped cap- 
 ture. Once indeed a party of Yankees sat on 
 the trunk of the very fallen tree among whose 
 dead branches he was hiding, and chatted for 
 some time. From their conversation he learned 
 that a negro had discovered our camp-fire the 
 night before and betrayed us to the enemy in 
 the morning. 
 
 While we were talking, one of our pickets 
 came running in to say that some men were 
 coming. They proved to be some of our 
 negroes that the Yankees had taken with them 
 to ride our mules and who had escaped from 
 their captors. They said that John and Johnny 
 had been forced to walk to Allston, six miles 
 away, but had not been harshly treated. John's 
 watch had been taken from him, but was re- 
 stored by the captain at Allston to whom he re- 
 ported the theft. 
 
 The Yankees had told the negroes that they 
 would capture Captain Green and me next day, 
 if they had to beat every bush, which, as the 
 little wood was not over a quarter of a mile 
 square, they could easily have done. We de- 
 cided, therefore, to escape in the night, I paid 
 
 214 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 one of my negroes twenty dollars to carry my 
 boys and John's back home and the leader of 
 the Niter Bureau negroes a hundred dollars to 
 see that those belonging to the Bureau were re- 
 turned safe, shook each heartily by the hand, 
 and bade them good-by. " Take care of your- 
 self, my dear Massah," " Good-by, Massah, 
 and God bless you! " " I hope de Lord will keep 
 you from dem Yankees, dear Massah ! " — such 
 were the parting words that greeted me on every 
 side as we moved off. Were they sincere? I 
 thought so then, and was really deeply moved 
 by their kindness. I believe so still, though I 
 now know that they were anxious for us to go 
 not only to secure our safety but also, and per- 
 haps chiefly, because they had some of our prop- 
 erty which they had begged from the Yankees 
 and did not wish to restore. Of such mixed 
 stuff is human nature — especially negro nature 
 — woven ! 
 
 We left the camp about nine o'clock and 
 walked rapidly and silently toward Columbia. 
 Having heard that the Little River bridge had 
 been burned, we planned to cross the river that 
 night and wait on the other side in comparative 
 safety until we knew that all the Yankees had 
 left Columbia. When within half a mile of the 
 
 215 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 bridge we heard light footsteps close behind us 
 and turning saw a well-dressed, intelligent 
 young negro almost treading on our heels. He 
 said he was on his way home, and pointed 
 toward a brilliantly lighted house some two hun- 
 dred yards from the road, in which he said there 
 was nobody but " colored folks." The Yankees, 
 he further told us, had been very troublesome 
 during the day and he feared would return dur- 
 ing the night. We deeply suspected that he 
 would inform on us, but had no idea that at that 
 very time a number of Yankees were quartered 
 in that very house. 
 
 We had got but half-way to the river, how- 
 ever, and were just entering on an embankment 
 that formed an abutment to the bridge when we 
 heard the clatter of the hoofs of horses gallop- 
 ing from the house of the " colored folks." In 
 an instant we were over the zigzag fence that 
 bordered the road and each squatted in a corner. 
 We were hardly fairly settled when twenty 
 Yankee cavalrymen dashed by so close to the 
 fence that their horses' heels struck the very 
 rails behind which we were lying. Soon we 
 heard them returning, after having satisfied 
 themselves that we were not on the embank- 
 ment. Instead of passing by again, as we had 
 
 216 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 hoped they would do, they reined up and dis- 
 mounted close to us. " Now," thought I, " we 
 are lost, for they are going to search the fence ! " 
 Instead they simply leaned against it and rested, 
 so near to us that I could have grasped one fel- 
 low by the leg. Bat I didn't! On the contrary 
 I moved not a muscle and hardly breathed. 
 
 After chatting for half an hour about bush- 
 whackers and fugitive Confederates, even men- 
 tioning our names, they remounted. " Let's try 
 this way," said one ; and they galloped in the di- 
 rection from which we had come, probably con- 
 cluding that we had suspected the negro and 
 turned back on our tracks, the very thing we 
 should have done had we suspected their pres- 
 ence in the house. I learned later that about 
 midnight they visited the camp that we had left. 
 
 When the sound of the retreating hoof-beats 
 had entirely ceased, we made our way through 
 the plowed fields to the river. It was impos- 
 sible to cross without more light, so we had to 
 wait for the rising of the moon at about four in 
 the morning. The night had grown very cold, 
 so for hours I paced up and down, stamping, 
 swinging my arms, and striking my chest, while 
 Captain Green sat on a log in complete exhaus- 
 tion, his head sinking lower and lower on his 
 
 217 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 knees. Suddenly I heard an agonizing cry. I 
 turned quickly, but Captain Green had disap- 
 peared as if the earth had opened and swallowed 
 hhn ! Running to the spot where he had been, 
 I found that in his sleep he had plunged for- 
 ward, and awakened standing on his head in a 
 drainage ditch six feet deep. Fortunately he 
 was not much hurt and for some time I could 
 not help him out for laughter. Afraid to trust 
 himself again in a sitting posture, he went stag- 
 gering about trying to keep awake. But in 
 vain. He fell asleep while walking and awoke 
 to find himself in the ditch again. The fact is 
 that the poor man, naturally feeble at best, was 
 so prostrated by want of food and rest and by 
 the constant excitement of mind and exposure 
 to the cold that he could scarcely stand. 
 
 After the moon had risen we easily waded 
 the river, which we found not more than knee- 
 deep, and with great difficulty scrambled up the 
 steep bank on the other side. Even on the level 
 road Captain Green could not walk over three 
 hundred yards without stopping to rest, and ere- 
 long he collapsed entirely. As I feared that he 
 would be seriously ill, I determined to apply at 
 the nearest farmhouse for restoratives, and 
 leaving him by the roadside ran to a house about 
 
 218 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 half a mile away. After some delay a woman 
 came to the door in answer to my calls. Her 
 expression was one of extreme fear. That 
 ghastly, terror-stricken face staring at me in the 
 cold gray dawn will haunt me forever ! I made 
 known my errand, and she and her husband, 
 who had fled through the back door on my ap- 
 proach, kindly offered to do anything they 
 could for the captain. A few Yankees had 
 visited the house the day before, she said, and 
 had promised that this day they would return 
 in force and " clean her out." They were ex- 
 pecting them every moment and had taken me 
 for an advanced guard. 
 
 I quickly returned for the captain, but did 
 not find him where I had left him. Realizing 
 what had happened I hastened up the road and 
 found, as I had expected, that having regained 
 his strength he had followed me, but instead of 
 turning up the lane to the farmhouse had kept 
 on the main road. As I overtook him just as 
 he was approaching another house, we told our 
 story there and were hospitably received. 
 
 A warm breakfast, a cup of hot rye-coffee, 
 and a blazing fire quickly and completely re- 
 stored Captain Green. He sat before the fire 
 in a most blissful state of mind, his lank legs 
 
 219 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 helplessly crossed, his head, peacefully resting 
 on the top of his chair, enveloped, as in a halo of 
 glory, in a cloud of smoke, a gauzy, but strong 
 veil woven by the magician Tobacco. It seemed 
 a pity rudely to bring his soul back from the 
 Heaven of Narcotism, tenanted only by good 
 angels of peaceful and innocent thoughts, to a 
 dull earth overrun by vile Yankees, but alas ! it 
 had to be done. 
 
 Soon after sunrise we started for a hiding- 
 place. We selected a thick clump of pine sap- 
 lings half a mile from the house, and had hardly 
 seated ourselves before the popping of guns and 
 the columns of smoke from burning homesteads 
 told that the enemy had begun their daily work. 
 As we were far from any house, we soon became 
 indifferent, however, and took turns at sleeping 
 and watching. 
 
 As evening approached the shooting ceased, 
 and, as it was very cold, we determined to 
 spend the night at one of the fires that we saw 
 blazing in every direction, and chose a burning 
 fence in a spot where we would be partly shel- 
 tered from observation, near the ruins of a 
 cabin behind which we could fly in case of dan- 
 ger. We had just finished a supper of pork 
 that was nearly all fat and corn bread as dry as 
 
 220 
 
FUGITIVE BEFOEE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 sawdust, when we heard footsteps cautiously 
 approaching. The newcomer proved to be the 
 owner of the fence, and I recognized him as the 
 man that I had frightened from his house early 
 in the morning. After tearing down two or 
 three panels of the fence so as to isolate the fire, 
 in which work we helped him, he went to his 
 home, which, as he had been in the woods try- 
 ing to save his horses and mules, he had not 
 visited during the day. In an hour or so he re- 
 turned with a pot of rye- coffee, a lot of bis- 
 cuits, and about a peck of sweet potatoes. The 
 captain and I sat by the fire and roasted pota- 
 toes all night. 
 
 Early in the morning we sought a new hid- 
 ing-place, for it was our policy never to use the 
 same place twice, as we might be observed and 
 betrayed by some prowling negro. The sun 
 was well up before we found a suitable place and 
 we flitted from bush to bush and from gully to 
 fence like belated specters. At last in our 
 fearful rambles we came to the main road to Co- 
 lumbia, but did not recognize it. Observing a 
 party of negroes, men, women, and children, 
 approaching, we waited for them to pass before 
 venturing to cross the road. To our vexation 
 immediately after we had observed them they 
 
 221 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 set down the large bundles that they were carry- 
 ing on their heads, and rested for about half an 
 hour. I did not dream that they were, as I 
 afterward learned, our own negroes on their 
 way home, or I should have sent a message to 
 my family. When they had passed we crossed 
 the road and about ten o'clock found a place of 
 concealment in a thicket that crowned a hill. 
 
 After a day passed much as the previous one 
 had been, we cautiously approached the house 
 of our new friend, whose name we had learned 
 was Leitner, to get a fresh supply of provi- 
 sions. We were received with unaffected kind- 
 ness, given an excellent supper, and cordially 
 invited to stay at the house all night. As the 
 Yankees had apparently gone on to Winnsboro, 
 after some hesitation, because we feared we 
 might bring trouble on our kind friends, we ac- 
 cepted. 
 
 By daybreak next day we were off to the 
 woods again. Our walk to a hiding-place re- 
 vealed the somewhat startling fact that all the 
 woods and thickets had been thoroughly 
 searched by the Yankees the day before. The 
 tracks of their horses were thickly scattered in 
 every direction, and had we not crossed the road 
 I do not see how we could have avoided capture. 
 
 222 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHERMAN'S ARMY 
 
 During the day we heard little shooting and 
 saw no columns of smoke, so on the urgent in- 
 vitation of Leitner we again spent the night at 
 his house. We concluded that the Yankees had 
 left and that on the morrow we could safely go 
 on to Columbia. But our hopes vanished when, 
 just as we were sitting down to supper, one of 
 the children discovered a fire not half a mile 
 away. We at once decided to spend the night 
 in the woods, rushed from the house, and ran in 
 the direction of the fire. From a hilltop over- 
 looking it we watched the burning building sink 
 into smoldering brands, but as we saw no 
 soldiers returned to Leitner's about midnight. 
 The experience showed us, however, that it 
 was not yet safe to venture on our way, so we 
 spent another day in hiding, and returned at 
 night to Leitner's. During supper the servant 
 announced that there were strangers at the gate. 
 In an instant Leitner, the captain, and I were 
 out of the back door and over the fence. The 
 newcomers proved to be Confederates, however, 
 fugitives like ourselves, members of the Medi- 
 cal Department on their way back to Columbia. 
 They had during the day met many pedestrians 
 from the city who concurred in saying that there 
 were no Yankees there or on the way thither. 
 
 223 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 We ate our supper in an ecstasy of delight, 
 therefore, and went to bed to dream of home. 
 
 The next morning, after a hearty breakfast 
 and a still more hearty good-by to our good 
 hostess, who could not be prevailed upon to take 
 a cent for all her kindness, we set out in high 
 spirits, though the rain was falling in torrents. 
 On we went at a swinging gait, my heart on fire 
 with the thought of taking supper at home, for 
 we had been told that though four-fifths of Co- 
 lumbia was in ruins, the College buildings had 
 been spared. But Captain Green tried in vain 
 to keep up, and by half past one was completely 
 exhausted. At a venture I went up to a house 
 to see if I could procure some food, and to my 
 surprise found it the home of an intimate 
 friend. "We were heartily welcomed and given 
 a delicious dinner with coffee, real, genuine 
 coffee, the first I had tasted for two years. 
 Moreover, my kind host insisted that Cap- 
 tain Green should stay overnight to regain his 
 strength. About three, therefore, I bade them 
 farewell and strode on at a rapid rate, walking 
 the six miles to Columbia in an hour and a half. 
 
 I entered the city at the extreme northern 
 end, and went down the whole length of the main 
 street, a mile and a half. Not a house was 
 
 224 
 
FUGITIVE BEFOEE SHERMAN'S AEMY 
 
 standing and I met not a living sonl! The 
 beautiful city, the pride of the State, sat desolate 
 and in ashes. The fire had swept five or six 
 blocks wide right through its heart, leaving only 
 the eastern and western outskirts. At last I 
 saw the brick wall surrounding the campus and 
 the buildings of the College, and a few minutes 
 later was knocking at the door of my own ivy- 
 covered home. Deep silence for a moment, then 
 the quick pattering of little feet along the hall, 
 then my wife and children hanging around my 
 neck with mingled laughter and tears. 
 
 Then followed a recital of experiences on 
 either side. Theirs had been far more dread- 
 ful than mine, but as I did not personally wit- 
 ness them I shall not attempt to describe the 
 terrors of the bombardment of the sixteenth 
 and seventeenth, the still greater terrors of the 
 entrance and occupation by the enemy, or the 
 inconceivable horrors of the night of the seven- 
 teenth. But a few facts learned that night from 
 my wife and daughters and later confirmed by 
 thousands of eye-witnesses, I will briefly state. 
 
 Our forces evacuated the city early on the 
 morning of the seventeenth, the Yankees enter- 
 ing and taking formal possession about nine 
 o'clock. General Sherman personally promised 
 16 225 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 the Mayor, Dr. Goodwyn, complete protection 
 and perfect security of personal property, and 
 during the day everything was quiet. A number 
 of officers, however, among them a colonel 
 quartered in my brother's house, hinted about 
 certain rockets that would signal the destruc- 
 tion of the city. About seven in the evening, 
 after ten hours of peaceable possession, when there 
 were no Confederate soldiers within fifteen 
 miles, these signal rockets went up from vari- 
 ous parts of the city and instantly fires burst 
 out everywhere. In an hour Columbia was a 
 roaring, surging sea of flames. The streets 
 were filled with ten thousand yelling soldiers, 
 running from house to house with flaming 
 torches, and even stealing their trinkets from 
 the frightened women who rushed into the 
 streets from their burning homes. Every house 
 in the city, except those within the campus walls, 
 was pillaged, and most of them first pillaged 
 and then burned. As the College buildings 
 were used as a hospital for the soldiers of both 
 sides, a guard was placed around them to pro- 
 tect them, but spite of this they were several 
 times fired and saved only by the exertions of 
 the physicians. Once their destruction seemed 
 so probable that all the patients were removed 
 
 226 
 
FUGITIVE BEFORE SHEEMAN'S ARMY 
 
 into the open area in the middle of the campus, 
 and the next day over twenty died in conse- 
 quence of the fright and exposure. At one time 
 my wife thought our home was certainly 
 doomed, and she spent the greater part of the 
 dreadful night with the children around her in 
 the back garden far from the house. 
 
 No one of the enemy had, however, crossed 
 the threshold of our door. Ah me! what a 
 fatality seemed to have pursued us and our 
 wagons ! Had we left the things at home, they 
 would have been safe ; had we on starting taken 
 the direct road to Allston, they would have been 
 safe; had we remained where we camped the 
 first night, they would have been safe; had we 
 stopped anywhere within three miles from Co- 
 lumbia and three miles from Little River, they 
 would have been safe. 
 
 Mr. Davis, I was told in answer to my in- 
 quiries, had slept the night of my departure in 
 the study in the basement of my house. Hav- 
 ing carefully examined the doors and windows 
 and found that in case of danger he could escape 
 into either the front or the back yard, he begged 
 that if any unusual noise was heard he might be 
 called at once, as he had had little rest for many 
 nights and would probably sleep deeply. Dur- 
 
 227 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ing the following day he had been arrested 
 as a Yankee spy on information furnished by an 
 old negress, but was promptly released by our 
 officers, who recognized him as one of our own 
 most trusted spies. The night of the sixteenth 
 he brought a tall, dark, villainous-looking man, 
 probably a Yankee spy, to my brother's house, 
 which, as it opened on the street, was more ex- 
 posed than any other on the campus, told him 
 to notice it particularly, and said in an authori- 
 tative voice, " Remember, / protect this house." 
 As the last Confederates were leaving the city 
 next morning he again came to my home and 
 begging one of my daughters to accept as a 
 memento of him some ribbons, feathers, and 
 other trifles, said farewell. In taking leave he 
 said, " Our army is going, but if the Yankees 
 enter your house, I shall certainly be with them. 
 Be sure you do not betray me by recognition." 
 He went and we never saw or heard of him 
 again. Was he a Confederate spy? Was he a 
 Yankee spy? Or was he a spy on both sides? 
 We never knew. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 AFTER THE WAR 
 
 During the entire war we suffered some- 
 what for food — I hardly tasted tea, coffee, or 
 sugar for four years — but after the burning of 
 Columbia we were straitened indeed. For a 
 week the negroes on our lot, some twenty in num- 
 ber, fed us with what they had gathered during! 
 the sack. After that for a couple of weeks pro- 
 visions came in from the surrounding country, 
 and we drew rations of beef, bacon, and corn- 
 meal from the city. Then I went to Augusta 
 and secured supplies from friends there, and 
 still later a tierce of rice that belonged to the 
 Niter and Mining Bureau was sent us from 
 Camden. 
 
 In the matter of clothing we were no better 
 off. "We had long before been reduced to the\ 
 coarse stuffs made in the Confederacy, and the 
 ladies wore nothing but homespun. But with 
 the taste characteristic of the sex they made \ 
 
 229 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 their dresses so neatly and trimmed them so 
 prettily that I have never seen more becoming 
 gowns. As I had taken all my clothing with me 
 when I left Columbia, I had nothing after my 
 return but what I wore on my back and that was 
 in rags. A benevolent society of ladies sup- 
 plied me with underclothes, but for outer 
 clothing I was compelled for a time to use the 
 cast-off blue of Federal soldiers who had died 
 in the hospital. My negroes were dependent on 
 me, as were those of the Bureau, about ninety 
 in all. I got cloth for their apparel, but as it 
 was impossible to obtain blankets, I was obliged 
 to cut up all my carpets to take their place and 
 for a long time my floors remained bare. 
 
 After the war came what was worse than the 
 war itself, the occupation by Federal troops and 
 the humiliations necessarily attendant thereon. 
 This, of course, we expected. But far worse was 
 the arrival of " Treasury Agents," those vul- 
 tures hovering over the rear of the army of 
 occupation, sniffing for carrion, hunting for 
 property to confiscate, taking accusations of any 
 and all kinds, especially those by irresponsible 
 blacks. Then followed the utter demoraliza- 
 tion of all labor and the intolerable insolence of 
 the negroes suddenly set free with all their pas- 
 
 230 
 
AFTER THE WAS 
 
 sions not only uncontrolled but often even en- 
 couraged. As I can not speak of these matters 
 with any calmness, I forbear to speak of them 
 at all. 
 
 In May, after the United States Comman- 
 dant had taken possession of the post, I went to 
 him and told him that there was a flat-boat on 
 the river that had belonged to the Niter and 
 Mining Bureau and was therefore confiscable, 
 but as it was of no value to the United States I 
 asked and immediately received permission to 
 use it in bringing corn for the city from the 
 plantations below. I went down the river with 
 a crew of negroes and brought up several thou- 
 sand bushels. The city allowed me a hundred 
 bushels, which I divided with John. On the 
 fifty bushels of corn thus received I lived, by 
 exchange, until August. The first money that I 
 had seen since the break-up in March then came 
 to me from the sale of cotton made the previous 
 year, for in 1865 none was even planted. In 
 January, 1866, the College was reopened, and 
 my salary, which during the greatest stress of 
 the war, in 1864, had ceased, began again. 
 
 As a result of the war I lost everything I 
 had in the world, for, except the eight thousand 
 dollars in bonds lost at the capture of the 
 
 231 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 wagons, all my property was in lands and 
 negroes. But this total loss did not in the least 
 dishearten me; I did not lose a wink of sleep. 
 This was partly because everybody else had suf- 
 fered in the same way, partly because I felt sure 
 that I could make my living somehow, partly, 
 and perhaps chiefly, because I had always been 
 oppressed by the ownership of slaves. Not be- 
 cause I felt any conscientious scruples about it, 
 but because I felt distressingly the responsi- 
 bility of their care ; because I felt that those who 
 own slaves ought personally to manage them, 
 as my father did. This I could not do without 
 sacrificing all my ambition in life and the health 
 of my family. The income from my land, on ac- 
 count of its situation, had always been far 
 smaller than its market v?lue warranted, and I 
 could at any time during the twenty years pre- 
 vious to the war have sold it and changed the 
 form of investment with great advantage to my- 
 self. This I refused to do purely out of kind- 
 ness to the negroes and because of a sense of 
 responsibility for their welfare. By their 
 emancipation, therefore, I felt that an intoler- 
 able burden had been lifted from my shoulders. 
 To the astonishment of all my friends, I as- 
 serted that, although practically it might be and 
 
 232 
 
AFTER THE WAR 
 
 in this case undoubtedly was, the freeing of 
 slaves was not necessarily any loss of property 
 at all ; that it certainly was not loss of property 
 in the sense in which the burning of a house is. 
 This was only saying that slaves were not prop- 
 erty, chattels, in the sense in which other things 
 are, and in fact they were never so treated in the 
 South. The right claimed was to their labor 
 and the change was simply from a slave-system 
 to a wage-system. I contended that, if the 
 labor remained reliable, the market value of the 
 slaves would be transferred bodily to the land. 
 For, I argued, under the wage-system, if the 
 negroes were reliable, the income of the land 
 would certainly be as great as ever. This was 
 admitted. Now, the value of land, as of every 
 other investment, is determined wholly by the 
 income. Q. E. D. The great impoverishment 
 of the South was due wholly to the complete dis- 
 organization of the labor as a necessary conse- 
 quence of the sudden change. 
 
 Looking back now from the standpoint of 
 1901, my contention is entirely justified. 
 Wherever the labor is reliable and the manage- 
 ment judicious the land makes as much now as 
 it ever did in slave times, and, therefore, the 
 owner is as rich as he ever was. He has suf- 
 
 233 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 fered no loss. But in some places negro labor 
 continues to be utterly unreliable. This is es- 
 pecially true of the so-called " black belt," where 
 the negroes are greatly in excess of the whites, 
 and more especially true in Liberty County, 
 where I still have nearly two thousand acres of 
 land, half of it very rich. It has never made 
 me a cent since the war. The negroes there will 
 not work for wages, as they can live almost with- 
 out work on fish, crawfish, and oysters; a little 
 patch of cotton furnishing them the means for 
 tobacco and clothing. They have no ambition 
 to improve, and live almost like animals. The 
 whole lower and richer part of the country is 
 practically given up to them, the whites having 
 nearly all gone elsewhere. And yet the kind- 
 liest feelings exist among the blacks toward the 
 whites, especially toward their former masters. 
 "Whenever I go down to the old place, I am 
 greeted with the greatest joy and affection and 
 called " Massah," as in slavery times. In 1892 
 old Sandy actually threw his arms around my 
 neck and embraced me. But they always ex- 
 pect some gratuity, and I never disappoint 
 them. In the middle and up country, where the 
 proportion of whites is greater, the negroes are 
 slowly improving in conduct and in thrift, but 
 
 234 
 
AFTER THE WAR 
 
 in the " black belt " they are either stationary 
 or are gradually relapsing into fetishism and 
 African rites and dances. 
 
 As has been said, the College reopened in 
 1866, the small salaries paid being supplemented 
 by fees from the students. To give a more 
 practical education, one more suited to the im- 
 poverished condition of the State, it was reor- 
 ganized on the plan of the University of Vir- 
 ginia, with independent schools and freedom of 
 election. In connection with chemistry I had 
 to give a course in pharmacy, and in connection 
 with geology one in agriculture. It was im- 
 possible, of course, to do this fully, all I could 
 do for pharmacy being to enlarge in my chemi- 
 cal course on the preparation and properties of 
 the substances used in medicine, and for agri- 
 culture to give a course of six or eight lectures 
 on the most fundamental principles underlying 
 the science and the art. Meager, very meager, 
 certainly; almost useless, the reader may say. 
 Yet I have heard some of my students who 
 afterward engaged in agriculture refer to this 
 short course with great satisfaction as having 
 been of decided benefit to them. 
 
 Meanwhile, in 1866, Johnson's plan of recon- 
 struction was tried and failed. Though I was 
 
 235 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 not a member of the convention which was held 
 in Columbia, a number of my old pupils and 
 friends were and with them I had many talks. 
 I insisted that the convention should adopt a 
 franchise without distinction of color, but with a 
 small educational and property qualification. My 
 friends admitted the wisdom of the suggestion 
 but said that it was impossible, as the leaders 
 had not " backbone " enough to propose it and 
 the people were not ready to indorse it. It was 
 a great opportunity lost, for, though Congress 
 would probably have repudiated Johnson's 
 plan anyhow, it would have been well to put our- 
 selves on record in this regard. 
 
 I never knew so much real social enjoyment 
 in Columbia as in the years 1866 and 1867; 
 society was really gay, the necessary result of 
 the rebound from the agony and repression of 
 the war. My daughters were then " in their 
 teens," and for their sakes we entered heartily 
 into the general gaiety. As everybody was poor 
 the gatherings were almost wholly without ex- 
 pense, and therefore frequent; the hostess sim- 
 ply furnished lemonade and cake and the young 
 men a negro fiddler. 
 
 The commandants of the post were changed 
 from time to time, five in all serving. The last 
 
 236 
 
AFTER THE WAR 
 
 two were really good fellows, much disposed to 
 fraternize with the people. The gentlemen of 
 Columbia were very cordial toward them, but 
 the ladies were inexorable. Nothing would in- 
 duce them to recognize the officers and their 
 wives; they were tabooed. I became quite 
 friendly with some of the officers, swimming 
 daily during the summer with them in " Rock 
 Spring," a splendid place for the sport; but I 
 could never induce my wife to invite one of the 
 gentlemen to the house for a social meal. We 
 men exchanged visits, but the friendship went 
 no further. 
 
 Under the provisional government estab- 
 lished by President Johnson, we got on very 
 well. A very dear friend of mine, Major Perry, 
 was appointed provisional governor. He was 
 a man of noble presence, untarnished integrity, 
 and sterling character, a Union man during the 
 secession movement, but loyal to the State 
 when it seceded. With such a governor and 
 the assistance of the military, whom we had 
 come to regard as our best friends, everything 
 went on prosperously, and the people were well 
 satisfied. But when the permanent govern- 
 ment was organized in the presence of bayonets, 
 with a carpet-bag governor, scalawag officials, 
 
 237 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and a negro legislature controlled by rascals, 
 things were very different, and at last became 
 simply intolerable. There was an income tax 
 of five per cent; my salary was two thousand 
 dollars, so I paid one hundred dollars ; I subse- 
 quently learned that I paid more tax than the 
 whole legislature put together. Think of such 
 a legislature making laws, and especially tax 
 laws, for a State! Anticipating somewhat, I 
 may say that this condition of affairs continued 
 and grew even worse until 1876, when, the car- 
 pet-bag government having become a stench in 
 the nostrils of the whole country, the bayonets 
 were removed, the whites assumed control, by 
 force when necessary, Hampton was elected 
 governor, and order was restored; prosperity 
 then again began and has increased from year 
 to year till the present time. The iniquity of 
 the carpet-bag government was simply inex- 
 pressible. The sudden enfranchisement of the 
 negro without qualification was the greatest 
 political crime ever perpetrated by any peo- 
 ple, as is now admitted by all thoughtful 
 men. 
 
 The College had been strongly reorganized 
 as a university with elective courses, and the 
 faculty greatly strengthened by the addition of 
 
 238 
 
AFTER THE WAR 
 
 Robert W. Barnwell as president and General 
 E. P. Alexander as professor of mathematics 
 and engineering. The former was a man of 
 imposing appearance, splendid ability, and 
 strong personality, the highest type of South- 
 ern gentleman and scholar; and I admired and 
 revered him exceedingly. The latter, who had 
 been chief engineer in Lee's army, was a 
 hearty, whole-souled, enthusiastic friend and 
 companion and a kind of genius in mathematics, 
 and especially in engineering. 
 
 The society in Columbia at that time was 
 one of the most refined and cultivated I ever 
 knew, making it a delightful place for my wife 
 and family. But the prospects for the South 
 were gloomy in the extreme. I bore the iniqui- 
 ties of the government as long as I could, but 
 when the negro legislature began to talk about 
 what they were going to do with the University, 
 I thought it time to quit. Colonies were being 
 formed to emigrate to Mexico and Brazil, and 
 for a while John and I thought seriously of try- 
 ing our fortunes with Maximilian. But just 
 then we heard through friends of the proposed 
 University of California, and wrote immedi- 
 ately applying for professorships. We were 
 elected, John in November and I in December, 
 
 239 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 1868, and this led to our removal to California 
 in the following year. 
 
 Meanwhile, in the winter of 1866, I had re- 
 sumed my scientific activity, which had perforce 
 been suspended when the absorption of the mind 
 in the war and its possible results made abstract 
 thinking and writing seem an absurdity, if not 
 a crime. During the winter of 1866-67 I gave 
 six lectures on coal and petroleum at the Pea- 
 body Institute in Baltimore, and in the follow- 
 ing year again commenced original scientific 
 work. From early childhood, as I have already 
 said, I had been singularly gifted in binocular 
 experimenting and in the analysis of visual phe- 
 nomena, and to this subject I now turned my 
 attention. My interest was excited by an elabo- 
 rate paper in the Archives des Sciences by Clap- 
 arede, and my ardor intensified by an address 
 by Helmholtz before the Royal Society. I at 
 once saw that both these papers were all wrong 
 in their interpretation of the phenomena de- 
 scribed, and immediately wrote three articles, 
 Adjustments of the Eye, Rotation of the Eye 
 on the Optic Axis, and The Horopter. These 
 were published in the American Journal of Sci- 
 ence in 1869* and reprinted in the London, Ed- 
 
 * XCVII, 68-77, 153-168, 168-177. 
 
 240 
 
AFTER THE WAR 
 
 inburgh, and Dublin Philosophical Magazine.* 
 They were the beginning of a series of twelve 
 or more papers that I later condensed and em- 
 bodied in the volume entitled Sight, in the Inter- 
 national Scientific Series. 
 
 * XXXVII, 131-140; xxxviii, 179-193, 193-202. 
 
 17 241 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 After having been connected for thirteen 
 years with the South Carolina College and Uni- 
 versity, I left Columbia in August, 1869. I was 
 very, very sorry to leave, for not only was the 
 society in the city delightful, but five months be- 
 fore my departure my eldest daughter had mar- 
 ried Mr. Farish Furman, and it was a bitter trial 
 for us to leave her and place a whole continent 
 between us. But Furman was a fine, energetic, 
 talented young fellow, an old pupil of mine, 
 whom I knew well ; and I was confident that my 
 daughter was in good hands. 
 
 From Columbia I went to New York with 
 my wife and daughter, and met there my sister 
 Jane and her daughter, who had decided to go 
 with us. As soon as we were sure that the 
 transcontinental railroad, which had just been 
 opened, was working satisfactorily, we started 
 west on it, and arrived in San Francisco early in 
 
 242 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 September. John and his wife, who had pre- 
 ceded us, met us on our arrival, and the next day 
 we went over to Oakland and took possession of 
 a fine, roomy house that John had previously 
 rented. The University had been completely 
 organized by John, who was to act as its pres- 
 ident until the election of such officer by the re- 
 gents ; and was opened on the twentieth of Sep- 
 tember, 1869, when I entered on my duties. 
 Eleven students were inherited from the Col- 
 lege of California, which had disincorporated 
 and turned its property over to the University, 
 twenty-five entered the freshman class, and one 
 or two enrolled as special students, a total of 
 about thirty-eight. 
 
 These early years in California were very ac- 
 tive ones for me, the wonderful new country, so 
 different from any that I had previously seen, 
 the climate, the splendid scenery, the active, 
 energetic people, and the magnificent field for 
 scientific, and especially for geological investi- 
 gations, stimulating my intellectual activity to 
 the highest degree. Coming to a new country, 
 I had to make myself known to the people, so 
 accepted invitations to lecture on many occa- 
 sions. In addition to popular lectures in many 
 places and frequent addresses before the Cali- 
 
 243 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 fornia Teachers' Association, I gave at least 
 twenty lectures on scientific subjects before the 
 Mechanics' Institute of San Francisco, and a 
 series on Sundays in Oakland on The Relations 
 of Science and Religion. This last course 
 was reported stenographically and published 
 by Messrs. D. Appleton and Company, consti- 
 tuting my first book. As in the University I 
 lectured on geology, zoology, and botany, I was 
 working to the limit of my strength. 
 
 Geology had now become my favorite de- 
 partment, but as to understand the geology of a 
 new country requires much time and travel, my 
 scientific activity was at first in other lines. 
 Especially did the fascinating subject of binoc- 
 ular vision interest me. I have already said 
 that my first papers on this were in answer 
 to Claparede and Helmholtz, and it is curious 
 that nearly all my work on this subject was 
 forced upon me by the publications of others 
 who were not able to analyze perfectly their own 
 visual impressions. Soon after I came to Cali- 
 fornia my attention was called to a series of 
 papers on Physiology of Vision in the Guy's 
 Hospital Reports by Dr. Townes, which, though 
 fundamentally wrong, were very suggestive to 
 me. From the nature of the misunderstandings 
 
 244 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 in this case, I saw plainly that a new mode of 
 diagrammatic representation of binocular phe- 
 nomena was necessary, and accordingly wrote 
 an elaborately illustrated paper, giving the new 
 mode and showing how all binocular phenom- 
 ena may be completely represented by it. This 
 was published in the American Journal of Sci- 
 ence in 1871,* and led up to a paper on Stere- 
 oscopic Phenomena f and one on So-called 
 " Images of Illusion " ; and the Theory of Bi- 
 nocular Relief,:}: in the preparation of which I 
 made many experiments on binocular perspec- 
 tive by the light of the electric spark. In these 
 papers I supplemented and completed the 
 theory of Briicke, already spoken of. Had 
 nothing else happened I suppose I might have 
 stopped here; but in the same year there had 
 appeared in the Archives des Sciences a most 
 elaborate paper by M. Raoul Pictet, entitled 
 Memoire sur la Vision Binoculaire, which was 
 itself an abstract of a still more elaborate mem- 
 oir in the Transactions of the Imperial Acad- 
 emy of St. Petersburg, that contained a theory 
 
 * The Mode of Representing the Position of Double Images. 
 Am. Jour. Sc, ci, 33-44. 
 f Ibid., cii, 1-10. 
 % Ibid., cii, 315-323, 417-426. 
 
 245 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 of binocular perspective that I saw at once was 
 all wrong, because based on an entire misinter- 
 pretation of the phenomena described. I gave 
 the true interpretation in the last of the above- 
 named papers, and published it not only in the 
 American Journal of Science but also in the 
 Archives des Sciences.* M. Pictet replied, and 
 I wrote a rejoinder on transparency of double 
 images, f giving an explanation that was con- 
 firmed by Professor Dor, of the University of 
 Berne, in a paper published in the Archives des 
 Sciences. In the same year Professor Tyndall 
 published in the Philosophical Magazine a let- 
 ter to him by J. L. Tupper, in which were de- 
 scribed some phenomena that seemed to him to 
 contradict the law of direction. I immediately 
 wrote, showing that, instead of contradicting, 
 they confirm that law4 It is thus seen that 
 the year 1871 was a fruitful one to me on this 
 subject. 
 
 Meanwhile, in 1870, our hearts had been 
 gladdened by the birth of the long-hoped-for 
 son. Though I had been well enough satisfied 
 
 * Nouv. Per., xli, 394-422. 
 
 f Sur la Transparence des Images Doubles. Arch, des Sc, 
 Nouv. Per., xlv, 229-232. 
 
 % On an Optical Illusion. Phil. Mag., xli, 4th ser., pt. i, 
 266-269. 
 
 246 
 
Design for the Le Conte Memorial Lodge of the Sierra Club, 
 to be erected in the Yosemite Valley. 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 with girls, for they are, I think, the light of a 
 home, we were all delighted that this child was 
 a boy. 
 
 In the summer of the same year, at the end 
 of the first session of the University, eight of 
 the students invited Professor Frank Soule", Jr., 
 and me to join them in a camping trip to the 
 Sierras, and we joyfully accepted. This trip 
 was almost an era in my life. We were gone 
 six weeks and visited the Yosemite, the high 
 Sierra, Lake Mono and the volcanoes in the 
 vicinity, and Lake Tahoe. The trip was made 
 in the roughest style of camp life, each man 
 carrying his bedding and extra clothing in a 
 roll behind his saddle, and a packhorse bear- 
 ing the food and camp utensils for the party. 
 We had no tent, but slept under trees with only 
 the sky above us. I never enjoyed anything 
 else so much in my life — perfect health, the 
 merry party of young men, the glorious scenery, 
 and, above all, the magnificent opportunity for 
 studying mountain origin and structure. Ob- 
 servations made on this and later trips formed 
 the basis for ten or eleven papers on this most 
 fundamental and fascinating subject and on 
 others closely related. I subsequently made 
 many similar trips, but this remained the most 
 
 247 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 delightful, because, as it was the first, every- 
 thing was so new to me and so different from 
 anything that I had previously experienced. I 
 do not attempt to describe it in detail, because 
 my observations, jotted down from day to day 
 at our noon camps, were published, in 1875, as 
 A Journal of Ramblings through the High 
 Sierras of California by the University Excur- 
 sion Party, and, the original edition being out 
 of print and scarce, reprinted by the Sierra 
 Club in 1900. 
 
 Although this trip was made in 1870, my first 
 paper on mountain formation was not pub- 
 lished until 1872,* the fact being that I can not 
 write without much reflection. It is not, how- 
 ever, so much deliberate, conscious, voluntary 
 reflection as the silent, unconscious germination 
 of an idea. The first paper was quickly fol- 
 lowed by another,! in reply to some criticism by 
 Sterry Hunt. 
 
 During the summer vacation of 1871 I made 
 a trip through Oregon, Washington, and British 
 Columbia, enjoying the unrivaled scenery of the 
 
 * A Theory of the Formation of the Great Features of the 
 Earth's Surface. Am. Jour. Sc, civ, 345-355, 460-472. 
 
 f On the Formation of the Features of the Earth's Surface. 
 Reply to Criticisms of T. Sterry Hunt. Am. Jour. Sc, cv, 448- 
 453. 
 
 248 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 Columbia and Fraser Rivers and Puget Sound, 
 and observing carefully the many important 
 geological features. The following summer I 
 made another horseback camping trip similar 
 to the one of 1870 and observed more carefully 
 glacial and volcanic phenomena. Observations 
 then made gave rise later to several papers on 
 the ancient glaciers of the Sierras and on the 
 volcanic phenomena about Lake Mono. 
 
 In 1873 I made another trip to Oregon, visit- 
 ing the Columbia and Des Chutes Rivers and 
 the John Day region, in order to examine more 
 carefully the origin, structure, and age of the 
 Cascade Mountains, and the phenomena of the 
 great lava-flood of the Northwest. Professor 
 Condon, of the University of Oregon, accompa- 
 nied me and directed all my observations. This 
 trip and the previous one gave rise to a paper * 
 that I regard as very important, since it first 
 drew the attention of geologists to the enormous 
 extent of the great lava flood of this region, 
 probably the greatest in the world, and the time 
 of its commencement, the end of the Miocene 
 period. 
 
 * On the Great Lava-flood of the West; and on the Structure 
 and Age of the Cascade Mountains. Am. Jour. Sc, cvii, 167- 
 180, 259-367. 
 
 249 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 During the fall of 1872, soon after my re- 
 turn from my second trip to the Yosemite, Agas- 
 siz visited us in Oakland. He had come around 
 the Horn on the Hassler, partly to observe and 
 collect marine animals, partly, by advice of his 
 physician, for his health. Naturally I greatly 
 enjoyed his visit, but it was the last time that I 
 was to see him. He returned to Cambridge 
 overland much improved in health, but died 
 there in the fall of the following year. The Cali- 
 fornia Academy of Sciences held a memorial 
 meeting, at which were made many addresses, 
 including one by myself, a tribute to him as a 
 man and as a scientist and a statement of what 
 seems to me to constitute his greatness. An 
 extract from this address has already been 
 given. 
 
 The summer vacation of 1874 I spent with 
 my wife and children at Lake Tahoe. Besides 
 enjoying the beautiful scenery of this gem of 
 the Sierras, I utilized the time in carefully ex- 
 amining the tracks of three old glaciers that 
 formerly ran down into the southern end of the 
 lake and of the splendid moraines and lakelets 
 formed by them. I had seen nothing like them 
 before except on the eastern side of the Sierras, 
 near Lake Mono. They had not been noticed 
 
 250 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 before, and my observations gave rise to a paper 
 published in 1875.* I also took occasion while in 
 the vicinity to visit the Comstock Lode and to 
 examine carefully several of the principal 
 mines, especially the Chollar Potosi, where I 
 was allowed every possible facility. This was 
 the beginning of my investigations on the struc- 
 ture and origin of metalliferous veins, on which 
 subject, after fuller investigations, I wrote four 
 or five papers. 
 
 The University of California received from 
 the College of California not only the buildings 
 in Oakland in which the College had formerly 
 carried on its work, but also a magnificent tract 
 of land some five miles to the north, which it 
 had acquired as a site for new buildings. While 
 the laboratories and recitation halls were build- 
 ing in Berkeley, as the new site was christened, 
 the University used the old buildings in Oak- 
 land. In June, 1873, two of the new buildings 
 were completed and the commencement exer- 
 cises were held in Berkeley. During the rest 
 of that year and the whole of the next the Uni- 
 versity was literally on wheels. There were no 
 accommodations at Berkeley, so students and 
 
 * On Some of the Ancient Glaciers of the Sierra Nevada. Am. 
 Jour. Sc, ex, 126-139. 
 
 251 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 faculty went out from Oakland in the morning 
 and came back in the afternoon, a horse-car line 
 having been built for that express purpose. 
 Gradually a town grew up around the Univer- 
 sity, and in the fall of 1874 I transferred my 
 residence to it. The town now (1901) contains 
 about fifteen thousand inhabitants. 
 
 The site of the University is certainly one 
 of the most beautiful in the world. Behind the 
 Berkeley hills, with their softly rounded forms 
 mantled with green, rise to a height of over two 
 thousand feet within the distance of a mile; in 
 front the ground slopes gently to the noble San 
 Francisco Bay, with its bold islands ; and beyond 
 the bay are the picturesque Santa Cruz and 
 Tamalpais ranges, three thousand feet high, 
 broken by the narrow strait called the Golden 
 Gate, through which from the University one 
 can look out on the limitless Pacific. Surely 
 such a site deserves an architectural plan of 
 corresponding magnificence, and such a plan has 
 now been provided through the munificence of 
 Mrs. Phoebe Apperson Hearst. 
 
 In 1875, with a party of four, all connected 
 with the University, I again camped in the high 
 Sierra. "We visited the Yosemite, Tuolumne 
 Meadows, and Lake Mono, and expected to go 
 
 252 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 southward to Lake Owen, thence over the Kear- 
 sarge Pass into the King's River canon, and 
 from there back to Berkeley by way of Fresno. 
 But a severe accident with dislocation of my 
 thumb and a general battering and bruising of 
 the whole body prevented me from carrying out 
 this plan, and we went no farther than Mono, 
 which I had visited twice before. This time, 
 however, I examined still more carefully the 
 volcanoes and visited the islands in the lake to 
 ascertain their structure and age. The outcome 
 of these observations was a paper On the Ex- 
 tinct Volcanoes about Lake Mono and their Re- 
 lation to the Glacial Drift.* 
 
 During this year, without any voluntary can- 
 didacy on my part, I was elected a member of 
 the National Academy of Science. As the 
 Academy was at that time limited to fifty mem- 
 bers, this unsolicited election was a great honor. 
 I might have been elected sooner but for the 
 iron-clad oath of uninterrupted loyalty to the 
 United States, which of course I could not take. 
 
 In 1876 I wrote several papers, of which the 
 most important was On the Evidences of Hori- 
 zontal Crushing in the Formation of the Coast 
 
 * Am. Jour. Sc, cxviii, 35-44. 
 
 253 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 Range of California,* and at commencement I 
 delivered an address on The True Idea of a 
 University, which in a modified and enlarged 
 form was published in the Princeton Review in 
 1880, f and, still further modified, in the Univer- 
 sity Chronicle in 18994 
 
 In June I went East to spend my vacation, 
 and while in New York consulted with Messrs. 
 D. Appleton and Company about a work on the 
 elements of geology that I had begun to write. 
 Then I went Philadelphia, staying with my 
 cousin, John L. Le Conte, and visiting the Cen- 
 tennial Exposition. One circumstance con- 
 nected with my visit I remember with especial 
 pleasure. As a critical examination of the im- 
 portant inventions exhibited was impossible on 
 account of the great crowds that usually 
 thronged the buildings, it was arranged that a 
 party of twenty scientific men should visit them 
 for this purpose on a Sunday. The special pur- 
 pose was the examination of the newly invented 
 telephones, particularly Bell's. Sir William 
 Thomson, now Lord Kelvin, Emperor Dom 
 
 * Am. Jour. Se., cxi, 294-304. 
 
 f The School, the College, and the University. Princ. Rev., 
 n. s., v, 177-204. 
 % I, 3-19. 
 
 254 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 Pedro and the Empress, Professor Barker, 
 John L. Le Conte, and I were among the party ; 
 and on the several occasions since on which I 
 have met Lord Kelvin he has spoken of his 
 pleasure in examining and testing Bell's tele- 
 phone at that time. I need not say how de- 
 lighted I myself was with this triumph of sci- 
 ence. I understood it at once and on my return 
 to Berkeley gave the students and faculty of 
 the University a lecture explaining it. 
 
 The heat in Philadelphia during the exposi- 
 tion was insufferable, and as soon as I could I 
 fled South and joined my family at Scottsboro, 
 the home of my daughter Emma. Here it was 
 much cooler, and in an ideal Southern home, with 
 plenty of horses and vehicles, surrounded by 
 young people whose hearts were full of a joy 
 that continually burst forth in music, we spent 
 a delightful summer. We returned to Berkeley 
 in August, but my daughter Sallie remained 
 with her sister and in the following January 
 was married to Mr. R. Means Davis, to whom 
 she had become engaged before we left Co- 
 lumbia. 
 
 Having completed my Elements of Geology I 
 sent the manuscript to Appleton in 1877. The 
 publication of it was a serious undertaking, but 
 
 255 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 they decided to publish provided I would super- 
 intend the making of the engravings and the 
 printing of the book. I went East in May, as 
 soon as I could get away from my classes, and 
 for three months worked harder than I ever had 
 in my life, being occupied every day for four- 
 teen hours selecting figures, directing the en- 
 gravers, correcting proofs, etc. And yet it was 
 a very happy three months. By August all was 
 done except the final correction of the page- 
 proofs of the last half, which were sent to me 
 at Berkeley. The book came out in January, 
 1878, and was successful far beyond my most 
 sanguine hopes. 
 
 I have said that my intellectual activity was 
 powerfully stimulated by coming to California, 
 and have stated the reasons for this. Foremost 
 among these was the fact that, contrary to my 
 expectations, I found here an exceptionally 
 active, energetic, and intelligent population. 
 What California wanted then, and still to some 
 extent wants, was a more thorough organization 
 of society — an organized public opinion; con- 
 ventions and traditions, with their wholesome 
 restraining influences on the weak and the 
 vicious. But the strong and the virtuous do 
 not need these ; are indeed perhaps better with- 
 
 256 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 out them. Family and name have but little in- 
 fluence here ; every man must stand on his own 
 merits. I confess I enjoyed this freedom, and 
 was quite willing to be judged in this manner. 
 I threw myself into my work with all my 
 energy. I enjoyed teaching, and this made my 
 teaching correspondingly interesting to my 
 students. I never tire of my subject; though 
 I have gone over my course in geology nearly 
 fifty times, I am still as interested in it as ever, 
 and though the whole subject is perfectly 
 familiar to me, never enter my lecture-room 
 without two hours of intense preparation. I 
 must revive my interest, must get up steam. I 
 am firmly convinced that investigation ought 
 not to be separated from teaching, as many sup- 
 pose; that not only is one a better teacher for 
 being an investigator but one is a better investi- 
 gator for being a teacher. We never know any 
 subject perfectly until we teach it. Nothing so 
 clears up thought as the earnest attempt to make 
 it clear to others by direct personal address. 
 Almost every good thought I ever had came first 
 into my mind during the heat of direct prepara- 
 tion for my class lecture. Nearly everything I 
 ever wrote was first given in my class-room and 
 afterward written out and perfected. My text- 
 !8 257 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 book, Elements of Geology, was simply the em- 
 bodiment of my daily class lectures, but far less 
 discursive and illustrative and therefore far less 
 interesting than the viva voce lectures. What- 
 ever success I have attained in teaching has been 
 the result of my intense interest in my subject 
 and in my students. The affectionate relation 
 between the students and myself increased from 
 year to year and my classes became larger and 
 larger till it was impossible to find a lecture- 
 room in the University buildings large enough 
 to hold them. 
 
 Meanwhile the University was growing in 
 resources, in complexity of structure, and in 
 numbers. At first its main source of income 
 was the Morrill Fund. To this the State added 
 from time to time appropriations for buildings 
 and a large endowment from the sale of tide 
 lands, and finally a small percentage of the 
 taxes, from which source the amount received 
 increases of course from year to year, so that 
 the whole income is now over $450,000. In 
 structure it was at first little more than the tra- 
 ditional college curriculum, with a little agri- 
 culture and civil engineering added ; but now it 
 has differentiated into nine colleges: Letters, 
 Social Sciences, Natural Sciences, Commerce, 
 
 258 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 Agriculture, Civil Engineering, Mechanics, 
 Mining, and Chemistry. To these must be 
 added the Lick Astronomical Department, at 
 Mount Hamilton, and the professional colleges 
 in San Francisco; Medicine, Law, Dentistry, 
 Pharmacy, Veterinary Surgery, and Fine Art. 
 The number of students has increased from 
 thirty-eight at the beginning to twenty-four hun- 
 dred in the colleges at Berkeley, and seven hun- 
 dred in the professional colleges, or more than 
 three thousand in all. The laboratory and 
 seminar have been introduced more and more 
 till in the scientific departments these are the 
 prominent methods of instruction. At first all 
 students were undergraduates, but now (1901) 
 there are nearly two hundred post-graduate 
 students, most of them applicants for higher de- 
 grees. In a word, at first and for many years 
 after its beginning the University of California 
 was small and apparently insignificant, little 
 known even in the State; now it is one of the 
 great universities of America. 
 
 The growth was at first slow and well with- 
 in the limits of its growing resources, but in 
 later years the increase in the number of stu- 
 dents has been so rapid as seriously to threaten 
 the efficiency of the work. The causes of its 
 
 259 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 enormous growth are: First, the increasing 
 closeness of connection of the University with 
 the schools. The whole educational system of 
 the State is now unified, with the University as 
 its head. Recommended graduates of over a 
 hundred secondary schools in the State, that 
 after careful examination have been duly ac- 
 credited, now pass into the University without 
 examination. Second, the closer relation of the 
 University with the industries of the State. It 
 is now recognized as never before that the busi- 
 ness of a university is to prepare for leader- 
 ship in all activities. A similar growth in uni- 
 versities, a similar " boom " in higher educa- 
 tion, has taken place all over the United States 
 for similar causes, but is perhaps more con- 
 spicuous in California than anywhere else. 
 
 The successive presidents who have contrib- 
 uted to this development and guided its course 
 are so well known that I need not dwell upon 
 them here. Of the many distinguished profess- 
 ors, I mention only those who have most in- 
 fluenced my own mental development. Chief 
 among them was, of course, my brother John, 
 who was to me not only an encyclopedia to con- 
 sult on all scientific facts but also a sympathetic 
 mind to discuss all scientific ideas with. Be- 
 
 260 
 
EAELY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 sides him, the most important to me were Pro- 
 fessors Hilgard, Moses, and Howison; Profess- 
 or Hilgard for all subjects connected with biol- 
 ogy and agricultural and geological chemistry; 
 Professor Moses for his strong common sense, 
 wholesome and practical, but also philosophical 
 in a practical way, and therefore in all social 
 and political questions; Professor Howison for 
 all questions in philosophy. I never knew a 
 more acute thinker than the last; I never knew 
 any one who had so thoroughly in hand the whole 
 literature of philosophy; I never knew any one 
 who could compare with him as a dialectician. 
 He and I often discuss together many philo- 
 sophical subjects, but we always approach them 
 from different sides, I from below, the scien- 
 tific, he from above, the metaphysical. We 
 always differ but are of mutual benefit and are 
 therefore the best of friends. The Philosophic- 
 al Union established by him, which is an open 
 court for the discussion of all philosophical 
 questions, has been a wonderful stimulus to the 
 intellectual activity of the University. 
 
 Another source of stimulus to me must not 
 be forgotten, the Berkeley Club, which was 
 founded by President Gilman and four or five 
 others, of whom I was one, in 1873, while the 
 
 261 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 University was still in Oakland. In my opin- 
 ion it is an ideal club. 
 
 Clubs are of two general kinds, intellectual 
 and social. The Berkeley combines the best 
 features of both, there being a dinner and after 
 that a paper and a general discussion thereof. 
 Again, intellectual clubs are of two kinds ; clubs 
 of kindred spirits, and clubs of diverse spirits, 
 the more diverse the better. This is a club of 
 diverse spirits. 
 
 One of the great evils of modern life and 
 modern education is overspecialization, and con- 
 sequently the loss of sympathy between men 
 of different pursuits. Society is thus broken 
 up into intellectual cliques, and is in danger of 
 falling apart for want of cohesive sympathy be- 
 tween its constituent parts. Clubs and societies 
 of kindred spirits only intensify this special- 
 ization. "What we want is clubs of diverse spir- 
 its to mitigate, if it can not destroy, the evil; 
 to keep each man in touch with all other depart- 
 ments of thought. My ideal of education would 
 be — first to make a man, by as general culture 
 as possible; next, a scientific man, if that were 
 the direction of his specialty, by a greater con- 
 centration on science, but on all the sciences 
 alike ; third, say a geologist, by still greater con- 
 
 262 
 
EAELY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 centration on general geology ; then at last a spe- 
 cialist on say mining geology. Thus we retain, 
 to some extent, a sympathetic relation to all de- 
 partments of thought. The interrelation of the 
 different departments of thought, especially of 
 scientific thought, is such that a good general 
 knowledge of all is absolutely necessary to the 
 highest success in any one special field. But in 
 spite of such a broad foundation, the increasing 
 stress of modern life will too much narrow our 
 minds, unless, fifth, we form clubs of diverse 
 spirits where we may get directly and without 
 much labor the best result of thought in other 
 departments. 
 
 This was the theory on which the Berkeley 
 was formed. It therefore consists of men of all 
 professions and pursuits — scientists, physi- 
 cians, lawyers, clergymen, merchants, business 
 men of all kinds, the only condition being that 
 each has the ability to contribute to the intel- 
 lectual entertainment and good-fellowship. All 
 sorts of beliefs on political, social, and religious 
 subjects are compatible with membership. In 
 religion, for instance, there are in the club all 
 grades of orthodoxy, heterodoxy, and no doxy; 
 theism, deism, pantheism, materialism, and 
 atheism — all are tolerated. All these views are 
 
 263 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 frankly but courteously expressed, and no one 
 takes offense. Where but in California could 
 such a club exist? 
 
 This club was an admirable means of culture 
 to me; I myself contributed some twenty or 
 twenty-five papers, and I discussed whenever I 
 could profitably do so the papers contributed by 
 others. 
 
 It might be supposed that the Academy of 
 Sciences was also an important element in my 
 career here, but not so. It had little effect in 
 determining my scientific activity. I read 
 many papers there, to be sure, and several of 
 them were published in their Proceedings, but I 
 always reserved the right to publish them else- 
 where also. Only one paper, that on the Car- 
 son footprints, to which reference will be made 
 later, was published by the Academy alone ; and 
 I regretted that I did not publish this elsewhere, 
 for its appearance was so delayed that I was 
 deprived of credit that properly belonged to 
 me. In the early days, about the time that I 
 came to California, under the presidency of J. 
 D. Whitney, the Academy was prosperous and 
 held a high position among the scientific insti- 
 tutions of our country; but from that time, be- 
 cause of internal dissensions, it dropped lower 
 
 264 
 
EARLY YEARS IN CALIFORNIA 
 
 and lower. Recently, however, it has begun to 
 revive, and is likely again to become an impor- 
 tant factor in the scientific progress of the 
 State. 
 
 So far as churches are concerned, I could 
 never take a very active part in any, because it 
 seems to me that they are all too narrow in 
 their views. But recognizing as I do that they 
 represent the most important of all human in- 
 terests, I have always very cordially supported 
 them all. The Congregationalists were the first 
 in the field when I came to Berkeley, and I 
 helped most heartily to build them up. Next 
 came the Episcopalians, and I helped the vener- 
 able and noble Dr. Wheat found this church, 
 and afterward contributed toward its support. 
 Of this church one of my daughters became a 
 member. The next church to be established was 
 the Presbyterian, of which Mrs. Le Conte and I 
 are members. Later the Unitarians organized 
 a church, and I helped to found and support it. 
 To the support of three of these churches I now 
 contribute, and I should be glad if I could sup- 
 port them all. Sectarian differences are noth- 
 ing to me. 
 
 265 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 SCIENTIFIC AND PHILOSOPHICAL PAPERS, AND 
 
 SUMMER EXCURSIONS; TO 1887 
 
 Returning to the account of my scientific 
 activity, in 1877 I wrote one of the most impor- 
 tant of my papers, On Critical Periods in the 
 History of the Earth and their Relation to Evo- 
 lution; and On the Quaternary as Such a 
 Period.* The idea contained in this paper had 
 been germinating for several years in my mind, 
 and has ever since continued to develop there. 
 It has been reembodied and expanded in several 
 successive papers. It is given in outline in my 
 Elements of Geology, f but in my classes I gave 
 it much more fully, and with increasing fulness 
 in successive years. In the same year appeared 
 my first paper on Some Thoughts on the Gly- 
 cogenic Function of the Liver and its Relation 
 to Vital Force and Vital Heat4 This also had 
 
 * Am. Jour. Sc, cxiv, 99-114. ' f Pp. 594-600. 
 
 % Am. Jour. Sc. csv, 99-107. 
 
 266 
 
SCIENTIFIC PAPERS 
 
 lain and grown in my mind, and was expanded 
 in subsequent publications, being finally, but 
 briefly, stated in my latest volume, Comparative 
 Physiology and Morphology of Animals, pub- 
 lished in January, 1900. The idea, if true, and 
 I believe it is, is certainly of far-reaching im- 
 portance in the theory of metabolism. 
 
 Captain Dutton, of the United States Geo- 
 logical Survey, wrote an able paper criticizing 
 my theory of mountain formation and especially 
 combating every form of the so-called " contrac- 
 tional theory." In 1878 I therefore wrote a 
 somewhat elaborate paper, On the Structure 
 and Origin of Mountains, with Special Refer- 
 ence to the " Contractional Theory," * in which 
 I more fully explained my views on that subject. 
 I wrote several other papers in that year, but 
 these were philosophical rather than scientific 
 and will be spoken of later. 
 
 In the summer of 1878 I took my usual relax- 
 ation by a camping trip to the Yosemite, but as 
 this time my wife and children accompanied me 
 that they too might enjoy camp life in the pres- 
 ence of the grand scenery of the valley, we 
 traveled much more comfortably than I usually 
 
 * Am. Jour. Sc, cxvi, 95-112. 
 
 267 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 did. Including a girl friend of my daughter's, 
 Captain Greenough, then Commandant of the 
 University Cadets, Mr. Charles Butters, a stu- 
 dent who acted as driver, and our Chinese cook, 
 our party numbered eight. Captain Greenough 
 and I rode horseback and the rest of the party 
 traveled in a fine wagon made expressly for 
 camping. "We were gone five weeks and visited 
 the Calaveras grove of Big Trees in addition 
 to the Yosemite. 
 
 The following summer also I devoted to my 
 wife's recreation, visiting Oregon, Washington, 
 and British Columbia on invitation of Mr. 
 George Ainsworth, a graduate of the class of 
 1873 and later a regent of the University, who 
 thought he could not do too much for his old 
 professor. His father owned the steamboats 
 on the Columbia, and we were guests on one of 
 them for a week, going up and down the river 
 every day. The scenery of the Columbia is 
 celebrated, and is to my mind finer than that of 
 the famous Hudson or that of the still more 
 famous Rhine or that of any other river that 
 I have ever seen. The week was surely one 
 of the most delightful I ever spent. Then we 
 went on to Puget Sound and saw the glory of 
 Mount Rainier and the Olympian Range, Mr. 
 
 268 
 
SCIENTIFIC PAPERS 
 
 Ainsworth still considering us his guests and 
 furnishing us passes everywhere. From Vic- 
 toria we went through the Gulf of Georgia with 
 its thousand islands and up the Fraser River to 
 Yale, the head of navigation. The scenery of 
 this river is almost as fine as that of the Colum- 
 bia, if indeed it is not in some respects finer. On 
 our way back to Portland, we stayed for several 
 days at Tacoma, and I took advantage of the 
 opportunity to examine the coal-fields at Car- 
 bon River. Surely these are very fine, and their 
 discovery is of great importance to the Pacific 
 Coast. They seem to me to belong to the same 
 age, the Laramie, or perhaps the Tejon, as those 
 near Seattle, which I had examined in 1871. 
 
 The year 1880 was a very active one in scien- 
 tific work. I wrote a second paper on glycogen 
 and its relation to katabolic processes * and one 
 on The Old River-Beds of California.-)- The 
 latter was the result of observations made dur- 
 ing a visit of about two weeks at the Blue Tent 
 hydraulic mine as the guest of the superintend- 
 ent. In his company I visited all the hydraulic 
 mines on both sides of the Yuba River. It was 
 
 * Some Thoughts on the Glycogenic Function of the Liver. 
 II. Disposal of Waste. Am. Jour. Sc, cxix, 25-29. 
 f Am. Jour. Sc., cxix, 17G-190. 
 
 269 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 at this time that the important idea of a great 
 elevation and rejuvenation of the Sierra Ne- 
 vada at the end of the Tertiary first occurred to 
 me. I had previously visited another mine that 
 occupied an old river-bed, but the idea had not 
 at that time dawned on me. 
 
 During this same year I also wrote a paper 
 on The Genesis of Sex, which was published in 
 the Popular Science Monthly * and reprinted in 
 the Revue Scientinque,f of Paris; one on The 
 Effect of Mixture of Races on Human Progress, 
 published in the Berkeley Quarterly;:}: and one 
 on Laws of Ocular Motion, published in the 
 American Journal of Science.* In the last I 
 took issue with Helmholtz on this difficult sub- 
 ject and showed that his views are not only 
 wrong but self-contradictory. 
 
 In the same year, moreover, I wrote my 
 book on Sight, which was published as a volume 
 in the International Scientific Series, and dur- 
 ing the summer went to New York to supervise 
 its publication. That done I joined my wife 
 and children, who were visiting my daughters in 
 South Carolina and Georgia, and stayed with 
 them for several weeks. In the vicinity of 
 
 * XVI, 167-179. % I, 81-104. 
 
 f T. xxv (sec. ser., t, xviii), 1880, 770-771. * CXX, 88-93. 
 
 270 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 Winnsboro I was shown what were supposed to 
 be glacier-borne boulders, but which I found to 
 be, as I had suspected, splendid specimens of 
 boulders of disintegration. After a delightful 
 summer we returned to Berkeley in August. 
 
 I made no long trip during the summer of 
 1881 because I was superintending the build- 
 ing of a house that was to serve us as a home in 
 place of the uncomfortable university cottage 
 in which we had been living since our removal 
 to Berkeley. With Professor Rising, professor 
 of chemistry in the University, I made a trip 
 of ten days to Sulphur Bank to reexamine 
 under more favorable circumstances the cinna- 
 bar deposits there. As mineral vein formation 
 seemed to be going on here under our very eyes, 
 I had for several years been extremely inter- 
 ested in this place, and had visited it four times 
 previously. Heretofore there had been only 
 superficial openings from above, but now a 
 shaft had been sunk and a drift run, and the 
 true vein struck at the depth of 260 feet. It was 
 a perfect example of a brecciated vein, a mere 
 breccia of country rock cemented with silica and 
 cinnabar. The evidence of the process of fill- 
 ing now going on is complete. In connection 
 with Professor Rising, who had first taken me 
 
 271 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 to the place, I wrote a paper proving that the 
 process is still in progress and giving the prob- 
 able chemical reactions. Though written in 
 1881, this was published in the American 
 Journal of Science in July of the following 
 year.* 
 
 In the summer of 1882 we again made a 
 camping trip to the Yosemite, partly for the 
 benefit of my daughter Emma and my cousin 
 Jack Le Conte, who had come to us from the 
 East broken down in health. Our party num- 
 bered eight, of whom seven went in a coach-and- 
 four that we hired, while Professor O'Neill, of 
 the department of chemistry of the University, 
 rode on horseback. We camped all the way to 
 the valley and back, and the six weeks in the 
 open air did the invalids a great deal of good. 
 My daughter was in an ecstasy of delight ail the 
 time, the exhilarating mountain scenery and 
 mountain air seeming to renew her youth in a 
 wonderful way. Jack and his father, John L. 
 Le Conte, who had accompanied him to Cali- 
 fornia, enjoyed the trip greatly, and the life of 
 the former was undoubtedly prolonged by it. 
 
 * The Phenomena of Metalliferous Vein-formation now in 
 Progress at Sulphur Bank, California. Am. Jour. Sc, cxsiv, 
 23-33. 
 
 272 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 For my own part, I think I enjoyed the valley 
 more, if possible, on this trip than ever before. 
 There are two kinds of enjoyment of scenery, 
 as of everything else. The one is the enjoy- 
 ment of beauty and grandeur, heightened by 
 novelty; the other is the enjoyment of the same 
 mellowed and hallowed by association. The 
 one affects more the imagination, the other the 
 heart. I had been in the Yosemite so often that 
 I now loved it for its association with previous 
 delights. 
 
 While I was in the valley there reached me 
 strange accounts of the wonderful footprints of 
 man and animals that had been discovered in 
 the prison-yard at Carson, Nevada; and I was 
 urged to examine them. As I was anxious also 
 to visit the Steamboat Springs, where mineral 
 vein formation was said to be still going on, im- 
 mediately after my return from the Yosemite I 
 went to Nevada with Professor Rising. First 
 we went to the springs, where we stayed sev- 
 eral days and found quartz veins containing me- 
 tallic sulfides, and even gold in very small 
 quantities, being formed from the hot alkaline 
 waters. We then proceeded to Carson and 
 examined carefully the wonderful footprints. 
 The prison is built of the sandstone on which it 
 19 273 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 stands, and over an area of two or three acres 
 in the prison yard the horizontal stone is liter- 
 ally covered with thousands of tracks of birds 
 and several kinds of mammals, both hoofed and 
 clawed. Among the tracks of animals the most 
 conspicuous and interesting were a whole series 
 of those of the mammoth and several long series 
 most singularly man-like in form, but of far 
 greater dimensions; each track being eighteen 
 inches in length and eight in width, the distance 
 between the right and the left series some 
 twenty inches, and the stride at least a yard. 
 As the exposed tracks were somewhat worn, we 
 set the prisoners at work blasting, and uncov- 
 ered some very fine ones both of the mammoth 
 and of those resembling the tracks of man. 
 There could be no doubt of their genuineness. 
 Several papers were written on these tracks and 
 read before the California Academy of Sciences, 
 one by Professor Harkness, one by Mr. Gibbs, 
 and one by myself. Professor Harkness thought 
 the man-like tracks were actually those of man, 
 while I thought they were those of a ground- 
 sloth, Mylodon or Morotherium, a view that sub- 
 sequent investigations have tended to confirm. 
 The strata, although quite lithified, are certainly 
 either latest Pliocene or early Quaternary, prob- 
 
 274 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 ably the latter. The process of lithifieation by 
 carbonated springs is still going on. 
 
 While here I was greatly interested in ob- 
 serving the criminals. They enjoyed the inves- 
 tigation intensely and worked very intelligently. 
 We entirely forgot that they were criminals, 
 and some of them murderers, and all worked to- 
 gether with interest. For all that we could see 
 they were much like average men, neither 
 better nor worse, and for the time we were com- 
 panions. The effect of the work and their in- 
 terest in it was wonderful ; before dull and sul- 
 len, they became bright, eager, cheerful, and 
 happy. What a reformatory measure such 
 work would be if it could be continued indefi- 
 nitely ! 
 
 From Carson we went southward to exam- 
 ine the deposits in the dried up lakes about 
 Candelaria — Teil's marsh, Rhodes's marsh, Co- 
 lumbia marsh, etc. By chemical processes of 
 great complexity and interest a variety of salts 
 are deposited here in great abundance, the prin- 
 cipal ones being soda borate, lime-soda borate, 
 lime carbonate, soda carbonate, soda sulfate, 
 and sodium chloride. The modes of occur- 
 rence of the borates are especially curious. 
 The tincal (native borax), in the form of crys- 
 
 275 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tals as large as hickory-nuts, is dug out of the 
 mud in great quantities, as ground peas are dug 
 out of the earth. The soda-lime borate ulexite 
 occurs as irregular balls, rough on the outside, 
 but found on breaking to consist entirely of 
 white, silky, radiating annular crystals. These 
 balls are dug out of the ground much as are 
 potatoes, which indeed they greatly resemble in 
 form and color. Though the subject is an ex- 
 tremely interesting one, I did not write a paper 
 on it, partly because it is a strictly chemical one, 
 but mainly because my investigations were too 
 incomplete. 
 
 My paper on the Steamboat Springs was 
 published in the American Journal of Science 
 in 1883,* and was followed in July of the same 
 year by a general one, On the Genesis of Metal- 
 liferous Veins. f The paper on the Carson foot- 
 prints was read before the California Academy 
 of Sciences in August, 1882, and the manuscript 
 given to the Committee on Publication ;% but its 
 appearance was delayed until some time in the 
 following year, and in the meantime Professor 
 
 * On Mineral Vein Formation now in Progress at Steamboat 
 Springs Compared with the Same at Sulphur Bank. Am. Jour. 
 Sc, cxxv, 424-426. 
 
 f Am. Jour. Sc., cxxvi, 1-19. 
 
 % Proc. Cal. Acad. Sc, Aug. 27, 1882, 1-10. 
 
 276 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 Marsh and others had visited the prison and 
 published the results of their observations. 
 
 The summer vacation of 1883 I spent with 
 my family visiting my wife's brother at San 
 Bernardino, Cal. During most of our stay we 
 were in camp in the mountains, and I made some 
 very important observations on the effect of the 
 rejuvenation of the Sierra at the end of the 
 Tertiary on the river-beds of this region as 
 compared with its effect in the region of the 
 lava flows in middle California, and the reverse 
 relation of the old and new river-beds in the two 
 regions. These observations, with those previ- 
 ously made, were embodied in an important 
 paper entitled A Post-Tertiary Elevation of the 
 Sierra Nevada Shown by the River-beds.* In 
 all my subsequent writings I refer to this as 
 " the rejuvenation of the Sierra Nevada." This 
 paper, although its substance was given in my 
 class lectures in 1883 and ever afterward, was 
 not published until 1886. 
 
 In 1884 I went to New York and superin- 
 tended the publication of my Compend of Geol- 
 ogy, for the use of high schools; and then 
 joined my family at Columbia, South Carolina, 
 
 * Am. Jour. Sc, cxxxii, 167-181. 
 
 277 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 where my son-in-law, Mr. Davis, was a professor 
 in the University. He lived in the honse that I 
 occupied when there, and it was a great pleasure 
 to me to be once more in my old home and to 
 meet again those of my old friends who still re- 
 mained. After visiting Scottsboro to see my 
 daughter Emma, who had been left a widow the 
 previous year, and to Macon, my old home, we 
 returned to Berkeley for the opening of the Uni- 
 versity in August. 
 
 During 1884 and 1885 I wrote many papers, 
 but as they were short, they may be passed 
 over without particular mention. In June, 
 1885, I received from Captain Dutton, of the 
 United States Geological Survey, an invitation 
 to join him in his summer camp in northern 
 California and Oregon, and was delighted to ac- 
 cept. I met him at Mount Shasta, and we were 
 together for two months and a half. But on 
 account of some delay in receiving the necessary 
 funds nearly half of this time was spent in camp 
 at Sisson's, a good illustration of the necessary 
 waste in government methods. The time was 
 not wholly wasted, however, for we took daily 
 rides to explore the country and made a trip of 
 four days around Mount Shasta, enjoying the 
 splendid view of the mountain from the east 
 
 278 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 and observing the five glaciers still living on its 
 slopes and the characteristic milkiness of the 
 water of the streams issuing from their snouts. 
 
 The money having at last arrived, we took 
 regretful leave of the kind friends we had met 
 at Sisson's, who had done much to relieve the 
 tedium of our waiting, and started on our way 
 northward to examine the great lava flow and 
 especially to visit Crater Lake. On our way to 
 Yreka we saw a splendid example of noncon- 
 formity, heavy-bedded, horizontal strata of cre- 
 taceous sandstone lying on the beveled edges of 
 highly inclined Jurassic slates. After a day in 
 Yreka, we went along the Klamath River to 
 Shovel Springs and camped there. These are 
 quite celebrated mud-baths, supposed to be very 
 curative and therefore resorted to by the lame, 
 the halt, the blind, the rheumatic, and the con- 
 sumptive. Here we first encountered the great 
 lava plateau, through which the Klamath cuts, 
 forming a canon two thousand feet deep. 
 
 As we climbed the side of the gorge next 
 morning to reach the plateau, the scene was 
 magnificent, the bright sun shining on the fog, 
 which filled the valleys but left exposed the 
 peaks and ridges, producing the most beautiful 
 effects. Later the fog-mantle was lifted grad- 
 
 279 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ually by the heat of the sun and drifted away 
 on a gentle wind, till the whole scene was 
 flooded with sunlight and the river boiling and 
 foaming two thousand feet below was plainly 
 visible. 
 
 For three days we rode on the top of this 
 great lava table-land without crossing a single 
 stream, so for water depended on the rare 
 springs whose positions in subordinate ravines 
 were known to the guides. What becomes of 
 all the rain that falls in this region? When we 
 reached Klamath Lake we found out. This 
 lake occupies a great sink in the lava-field, 
 probably a sunken earth-crust block; the rain- 
 fall sinks in the lava till it reaches an im- 
 permeable stratum, probably the surface on 
 which the lava was originally outpoured, then 
 works out around the margin of the lake as 
 great springs, the sources of rivers of consider- 
 able size. Where these enter the lake there 
 are small bays with deep water to the very 
 shore, and here the little steamers that ply on 
 the lake take the logs delivered by the logging 
 teams. As the lake is surrounded by exten- 
 sive marshes, were it not for these springs 
 there could be no commerce on it except by 
 building long and expensive moles. I had fe- 
 
 280 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 licitated myself all along on having delightful 
 swimming in the lake, but a single plunge in 
 one of these springs was enough, for while the 
 water of the lake itself is warm that in the 
 springs is ice-cold. In all my experience I 
 never saw such beautiful camping grounds as 
 we found on the western side of Klamath Lake, 
 especially as we approached the northern end; 
 great trees, placed as in a park, spread their 
 branches overhead and the grass was almost 
 knee-deep. 
 
 After camping one night at Fort Klamath 
 and making many pleasant acquaintances with 
 the officers, we continued on our way to Crater 
 Lake. The lava in this region we observed is 
 quite different from that of the lava table, being 
 rhyolitic instead of basaltic. It is probably 
 local, from " Mount Mazama." On the slopes 
 going up toward the lake the streams have cut 
 precipitous canons a thousand feet deep in this 
 whitish tufaceous material. Having camped 
 overnight five miles from the lake, we easily 
 reached it the next day before noon. The crater 
 is unseen until one stands on its very brink, 
 when the whole wonderful view bursts upon 
 one ; the great crater, eighteen hundred feet deep 
 and seven miles across, the exquisite lake with 
 
 281 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 its pure ultramarine waters, the lofty mountains 
 that surround it — surely the whole forms one 
 of the most wonderful and beautiful views in 
 the world! After gazing in rapture for half 
 an hour or more, we made our camp on a carpet 
 of moss and flowers in a beautiful grove of Wil- 
 liamson's spruce. 
 
 We were-the first scientific party that ever 
 visited the lake. The next summer it was 
 /visited again by Captain Button and somewhat 
 later by J. S. Diller. The general explanation 
 was evident at once, and their investigations 
 made out with certainty the mode of formation 
 of this wonderful crater and lake. The explana- 
 tion can be given most clearly by a brief history 
 of the lake. Immediately before, or perhaps 
 during, the glacial epoch, there existed here a 
 very great volcanic mountain, which has been 
 given the name Mount Mazama. Some time in 
 the glacial epoch a great eruption blew off the 
 top of this and scattered it far and wide, leav- 
 ing a yawning chasm seven miles wide and 
 nearly four thousand feet deep, which later 
 was filled with water to the depth of two thou- 
 sand feet, leaving a rim eighteen hundred feet 
 high. By a subsequent eruption a small crater 
 and cone were built about six hundred feet 
 
 282 
 
SUMMER EXCURSIONS 
 
 above the water-level, and these form Wizard's 
 Island. 
 
 After camping three days in this delightful 
 place, I took regretful leave of the party to re- 
 turn to my duties at the University. The guide 
 went with me, partly to show me the way, partly 
 to procure provisions for the party. I was 
 greatly struck and amused with the difference 
 in the behavior of my mule going and return- 
 ing. Soon after leaving Shasta I had observed 
 that she was a beast of conscientious character 
 and immovable principles, absolutely refusing 
 to ride abreast with the captain but insisting 
 on following. As this not only made it impos- 
 sible to converse but interfered greatly with 
 rapid riding, I whipped her until my arms 
 ached and spurred her until her sides were 
 bloody, but all to no purpose. With every 
 plunge of the spur there was a slight start, for 
 the flesh is weak, but no change of purpose. 
 She did not resent, seeming to think that I was a 
 dispensation of Providence that must be borne 
 with meek resignation, Satan sent to buffet her 
 for a season ; but her power to bear was greater 
 than mine to afflict. But now for the first time 
 I learned the reason of her obstinacy; she evi- 
 dently acknowledged the superiority, the head- 
 
 283 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ship, of the horse that Captain Dutton was rid- 
 ing. She knew her place ; it was unbecoming in 
 her to walk beside her lord and master. As the 
 guide, however, was also mounted on a mule, 
 she made no objection to riding abreast and 
 often, indeed, took the lead. We traveled 
 rapidly, therefore, making twenty-two miles the 
 first afternoon in less than five hours. 
 
 I had before this noticed the curious fact 
 that with a large number of mules a bell-mare is 
 necessary, which the mules follow precisely as 
 colts would. Is this the result of the retention 
 of the colt instinct in the sexless mules'? In 
 horses the arising of the sex instinct destroys 
 the colt instinct; mules do not lose the colt in- 
 stinct. 
 
 On the way back I noticed in the deep 
 canons on the western slope of Mount Mazama 
 remnants of the steep walls left standing out 
 like castellated pinnacles, sometimes five hun- 
 dred feet high and not over twenty feet in 
 diameter at the base, evidently harder parts left 
 by erosion. From them the water-course re- 
 ceives the name Castle Creek. On our way we 
 rode continuously for thirty miles through the 
 most frightful burnt forest I ever saw. The 
 firs stood as thick as possible, every tree from 
 
 284 
 
SCIENTIFIC PAPERS 
 
 two hundred to two hundred and fifty feet high, 
 but all was a mere blackened desert ; we saw not 
 one living thing. It was one of the saddest of 
 sights. After riding for several days we 
 reached the railroad at Medf ord, and I returned 
 home, having ridden about five hundred miles. 
 
 I at once commenced embodying my views 
 on the post-Tertiary elevation of the Sierra in 
 a paper. The idea was really contained, but im- 
 perfectly, in my paper on old river-beds, already 
 referred to as having been published in 1879.* 
 The paper with the complete idea was finished 
 in 1885, and read before the National Academy 
 in April, 1886, but its publication was delayed 
 through no fault of mine until the summer.f 
 Meanwhile J. S. Diller was writing on the same 
 subject and his paper was published a month 
 before mine. Who should claim the credit? I 
 neither know nor care. 
 
 But here I must stop to say something of 
 my intellectual history in other lines than sci- 
 ence. Until I was thirty I could not have said 
 whether my tastes were more in the direction 
 of science or of art and literature or of philos- 
 
 * Am. Jour. Sc, cxix, 176-190. 
 
 f A Post-Tertiary Elevation of the Sierra Nevada Shown by 
 the River-beds. Am. Jour. Sc, cxxxii, 1G7-181. 
 
 285 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ophy. Circumstances turned me mainly in the 
 direction of science, but I could never be a spe- 
 cialist in the narrow sense of the term, My 
 writings and my thoughts, like my education, 
 have been in many directions. In some respects 
 this may have been a disadvantage in my career, 
 for more and more in these modern times it be- 
 comes necessary to concentrate on special lines ; 
 but it has its advantages also, and I do not 
 regret it, for work in the higher regions of 
 thought is not possible without a wide outlook 
 that enables one to perceive its relations to other 
 departments. 
 
 Soon after coming to California, in addi- 
 tion to recasting into more popular form a num- 
 ber of early articles, I wrote a series of papers 
 on evolution that in substance were later em- 
 bodied in my book, Evolution and its Relations 
 to Religious Thought. The subject of evolu- 
 tion, because it unites science and philosophy, 
 was always especially attractive to me. As al- 
 ready stated, the reading of The Vestiges of the 
 Natural History of Creation, which advocated 
 the derivative origin of species, formed an 
 epoch in my intellectual history, though I was 
 not prepared to embrace its views. Later I 
 rear and reread with enthusiasm Owen's Arche- 
 
 286 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL PAPERS 
 
 type and Homologies of the Vertebrate Sys- 
 tem, and found the idea of law and correspond- 
 ence running through all the infinitely diversi- 
 fied forms of nature a grand and captivating 
 one. Though he bitterly repudiated evolution, 
 my studies with Agassiz led me strongly in 
 that direction, for, as I show in my book, he laid 
 the whole foundation of evolution in his grand 
 laws of succession of organic forms in the geo- 
 logical history of the earth. Then in Athens, 
 when I was about thirty, I fell in with Comte's 
 Positive Philosophy, and Whewell's History of 
 the Inductive Sciences, and Philosophy of the 
 Inductive Sciences, which was also an epoch in 
 the history of my thought-life. Later I read 
 many clistinctly philosophical works, those of 
 Sir "William Hamilton, Cudworth, Paulsen, and 
 Spencer, for instance, and dipped into many 
 others, among them the works of Kant, Fichte, 
 Hegel, and Berkeley. But I can not say that I 
 ever mastered the technology of philosophy, 
 which indeed repelled me; and whatever philo- 
 sophic thinking I have done has been wholly 
 from the standpoint of science. Yet some of 
 my dearest and most valued friends think that 
 my reputation hereafter will be more philo- 
 sophic than scientific. It may be so, for even my 
 
 287 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 science is not special in the narrow sense, but 
 is rather a sort of philosophic science, dealing 
 mainly with larger questions. The domains of 
 science and philosophy are not separated by 
 hard and fast lines; they largely overlap; and 
 it is in this border land that I love to dwell. 
 
 Brief reference is all that is necessary to an 
 article on Plato's Doctrine of the Soul, and Ar- 
 gument for Immortality, in Comparison with the 
 Doctrine and Argument Derived from the Study 
 of Nature, published by the Philosophical Union 
 of the University,* and several articles in the 
 Princeton Review, among them The Psychical 
 Relation of Man to Animals f (later modified 
 and published in the Monist $), and Illustrations 
 of a Law of Evolution of Thought f but my 
 book, Evolution and its Relation to Religious 
 Thought, is more important, and the circum- 
 stances that led me to undertake it may prove 
 interesting. 
 
 In the spring of 1885 the Rev. Henry Ward 
 Beecher, having declared himself an evolution- 
 ist, came to California to lecture on the sub- 
 ject. My friend and neighbor, Mr Sherman 
 Day, son of President Jeremiah Day of Yale, 
 
 * VIII, 1-19. % VI, 356-381. 
 
 . f N. S., xiii, 236-261. * N. S., viii, 373-393. 
 
 288 
 
PHILOSOPHICAL PAPEKS 
 
 knowing that I had written a number of papers 
 on evolution asked me for copies that he might 
 give them to Mr. Beecher, whom he knew well 
 but whom I had not then met. On leaving Cali- 
 fornia Mr. Beecher sent me a letter urging me 
 to write a book on the subject, saying, indeed, 
 that I owed it to the world. I had often thought 
 of doing so, but shrank from the task, partly be- 
 cause I feared that the church was not ready 
 to be profited by such a book and partly be- 
 cause it would absorb too much of my time. 
 But this letter of Mr. Beecher determined me, 
 and I commenced the work in the fall of 1885. 
 A rough draft was already written when I was 
 interrupted by an urgent request to write for 
 the Longfellow Memorial Association of the 
 University the first of a series of papers by dif- 
 ferent professors on various phases and epochs 
 of art. The subject assigned to me was The 
 General Principles of Art and their Application 
 to the " Novel," the idea being to lay a solid 
 foundation of principles upon which the Asso- 
 ciation should subsequently work. The paper 
 was read in the spring of 1886, and was later 
 published in the Overland Monthly.* The prep- 
 
 *Sec. ser., v, 337-347. 
 20 289 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 aration of it, with the necessity of bringing out 
 my views on the rejuvenation of the Sierra, 
 interrupted my work on the book for many 
 months. In the fall I resumed it and sent the 
 manuscript of the first part, What is Evolu- 
 tion? to the publishers for examination. It 
 having been approved, I finished the book in 
 1887, and it was published early in the follow- 
 ing year. 
 
 Its success was far greater than my expecta- 
 tions. The intelligent public seemed to have 
 been waiting for such a book, especially for the 
 third part, The Relation of Evolution to Re- 
 ligious Thought. Since its publication I have 
 received letters from many clergymen, of every 
 denomination, who were personally unknown to 
 me, thanking me for the boldness yet temper- 
 ateness of the book ; some thirty or forty young 
 men of high intelligence, many of them scien- 
 tific men, though personally strangers, have 
 written to thank me for a book that they said 
 had saved them from blank materialism; and 
 men of the highest distinction in England, 
 France, and Italy have sent me letters of similar 
 import. There can be no doubt that the book 
 was timely and has done much good, which, of 
 course, greatly gratified me. 
 
 290 
 
CHAPTER Xn 
 
 GEOLOGICAL EXCURSIONS; FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE; 
 
 1887-1892 
 
 In 1887, by invitation of the Rev. George 
 Wharton James, I made a trip by " buckboard " 
 through Modoc County, taking my son Joe with 
 me and giving him his first experience of camp 
 life. We went from Reno, Nevada, by Pyramid 
 and Winnemucca Lakes to Surprise Valley and 
 thence on foot and horseback to Warner Moun- 
 tain, camping for about three weeks on Blue 
 Lake, seven thousand feet above the sea-level. 
 The scenery about Pyramid Lake is very beau- 
 tiful and the geology of the region is extremely 
 interesting, Pyramid and Winnemucca Lakes 
 being remnants of the great Lake Lahontan of 
 glacial times. The old lake terraces, with their 
 calcareous deposits still hanging on the sur- 
 rounding slopes, mark the former height of the 
 waters. The subject has been exhaustively 
 treated by Professor I. C. Russell, of the United 
 
 291 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 States Geological Survey, but I greatly enjoyed 
 verifying his results by personal examination. 
 I was also much interested in the structure of 
 Surprise Valley. This is about seventy miles 
 long and only eight or ten miles wide, with 
 mountains rising abruptly on each side two or 
 three thousand feet, evidently a fault-scarp. 
 The bottom of the valley is quite flat and once 
 formed the bed of a lake, of which three small 
 remnants still remain. The valley is the re- 
 sult of a double fault and a dropped wedge. 
 Russell had already explained the general 
 structure of this region as an example of 
 mountain making by block tilting, and I was 
 delighted to find so good an example of this as 
 Surprise Valley. In my paper on The Origin 
 of Transverse Mountain-Valleys and Some 
 Glacial Phenomena in those of the Sierra Neva- 
 da, published in 1898,* I made use of this to 
 explain many things in the structure of the 
 valleys in the Sierras and in other parts of the 
 world. 
 
 In this year, 1887, I wrote a paper on The 
 Flora of the Coast Islands of California in 
 Relation to Recent Changes of Physical Geog- 
 
 * Univ. Chronicle, i, 479-497. 
 
 292 
 
GEOLOGICAL EXCURSIONS 
 
 rapliy,* the facts for which were given me by 
 E. L. Greene, professor of botany in the Uni- 
 versity, though the interpretation of them was 
 entirely my own. In the same year I addressed 
 the California Teachers' Association on Sense- 
 training and Hand-training in the Public 
 Schools,f maintaining that in all grades of edu- 
 cation the brain is best trained in connection 
 with the eye and the hand. 
 
 In May, 1888, occurred a great event in the 
 history of the University, the formal transfer 
 of the Lick Observatory to the Regents of the 
 University of California. It was a great occa- 
 sion, and addresses were made on behalf of the 
 Trustees of the James Lick Trust and of the 
 Regents of the University. I was selected to 
 represent the regents and the faculty, and am 
 willing to let my address on that occasion stand 
 as representative of my style in thought and ex- 
 position. 
 
 In the same year I contributed to the Popu- 
 lar Science Monthly an article on The Problem 
 of a Flying-Machine,:}: in which I took strong 
 ground against the physical possibility of a fly- 
 
 * Bulletin Cal. Acad, of Sc, viii, 515-520. 
 | Pacific Educ. Jour., iii, 41-52. 
 X XXXIV, 69-76. 
 
 293 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ing machine. Later, in 1894,* I modified my 
 views in the light of Langley's experiments on 
 the properties of an aeroplane and retracted 
 some extreme statements ; but the main conclu- 
 sions of the paper I believe still remain true. 
 
 During the summer of 1888 I again visited 
 my daughters and grandchildren in the South 
 Atlantic States, and while there addressed the 
 Philosophic Society of Atlanta on the subject 
 of evolution. I was delighted to find much in- 
 tellectual activity in this society, which was un- 
 der the presidency of the Rev. Dr. Armstrong, 
 a very liberal and independent thinker. 
 
 The following summer I again went camp- 
 ing in the Sierras with a party of young men, 
 of whom my son was one ; and for the first time 
 felt that I was losing my physical endurance. 
 I was then sixty-six, and the long ride over the 
 hot San Joaquin plains not only greatly fatigued 
 me but utterly destroyed my appetite. It was 
 not till we were well up in the mountains that 
 my strength returned, but from that time on I 
 was as strong as ever and enjoyed life as much 
 as the youngest of the party. We went only 
 over ground that was already familiar to me — 
 
 * New Lights on the Problem of Flying. Pop. Sc. Mo., xliv, 
 
 744-757. 
 
 294 
 
GEOLOGICAL EXCUBSIONS 
 
 Yosemite, Tuolumne Meadows, Mono Pass, 
 Mono Lake, etc. — but I made the trip again 
 partly for the love of camp life, partly that I 
 might impart my love of nature to my pupils, 
 and particularly to my son. He has since be- 
 come the best camper and mountaineer I ever 
 knew, tramping four or five hundred miles in 
 the Sierras every summer and probably know- 
 ing them better than any other living man, un- 
 less possibly Mr. John Muir. He is, moreover, 
 an extremely expert photographer ; I have never 
 seen anything equal to his photographs of the 
 Yosemite and the High Sierra. 
 
 My brother John was given leave of absence 
 with full salary from July, 1889, until July, 1890, 
 and planned to spend it in recreation and foreign 
 travel. But when he had made all preparations 
 for his departure, his wife was taken extremely 
 ill and was nursed back to life and comparative 
 health only by the most tender care and unre- 
 mitting attention on his part. He at once gave 
 up all hope of recreation, and spent the whole 
 year by her side, the most beautiful example 
 of self-sacrificing devotion I ever witnessed. 
 When the University reopened in August, 1890, 
 he took up the burden of his work bravely and 
 cheerfully but unrefreshed. I easily saw that 
 
 295 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 he was failing, and at last one day in February, 
 1891, he came to my room looking very weary 
 and said that he felt that his life-work was done 
 and that he desired to be relieved at the end of 
 the term. I immediately consulted the regents 
 and it was arranged that he should be substan- 
 tially relieved, retaining his title and salary, but 
 doing only such work, in kind and amount, as he 
 desired. But alas ! an attack of la grippe easily 
 exhausted his remaining stock of life and he 
 died, in his seventy-third year, on April 29th, 
 within two weeks of his promised rest. 
 
 The loss to me is inconceivable, With but 
 brief interruptions, we had been companions all 
 our lives; as children on the old plantation, as 
 fellow-students in college and professional 
 school, and as colleagues in Athens, Columbia, 
 and Berkeley. My estimates of his character 
 and scientific career have already been given in 
 his memoir in the publications of the National 
 Academy of Science,* of which we were both 
 members, and need not be repeated here. I 
 there state the loss to science by his death ; but 
 my own personal loss it is impossible to express. 
 The sense of loss felt by the community, the 
 
 * Biog. Memoirs, iii, 369-393. 
 
 296 
 
Professor John Le Conte. 
 
GEOLOGICAL EXCURSIONS 
 
 State, and especially the University, was shown 
 by the public funeral given him by the Uni- 
 versity. 
 
 He was more than four years my senior. I 
 have already (1901) lived over five years longer 
 than he did, and am yet much stronger than he 
 was during the months that preceded his death. 
 As in other elements contributive to long life — 
 even temperament, for example, and the love of 
 one's own household — we were equally blest, I 
 attribute this mainly to my passion for camp 
 life and the mountains. 
 
 The years 1890 and 1891 were such active 
 ones with me that I can do no more than men- 
 tion some of my more important papers: The 
 General Interior Condition of the Earth ; * On 
 the Origin of Normal Faults and of the Struc- 
 ture of the Basin Region ; f Ptomaines and Leu- 
 comaines and their Relation to Disease ; X The 
 Natural Grounds of Belief in a Personal Im- 
 mortality ; * The Factors of Evolution ; 1 1 Ter- 
 tiary and Post-Tertiary Changes of the Atlan- 
 tic and Pacific Coasts with a Note on the Rela- 
 
 * Am. Geol., iv, 38-44. 
 
 f Am. Jour. Sc, cxxxviii, 257-263. 
 % Pac. Med. Jour., xxxii, 529-532. 
 
 # Andover Rev., xiv, 1-13. 
 1 Monist, i, 321-335. 
 
 297 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tion between Land-Elevation and Ice- Accumula- 
 tion during the Quaternary Period;* Evolu- 
 tion and Human Progress ; f and The Relation 
 of the Church to Modern Scientific Thought. % 
 In 1891 I was elected President of the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Science. As already stated I became a member 
 of this association in 1850 and was made a mem- 
 ber of the Governing Council and General Secre- 
 tary in 1861. I was on the road to advance- 
 ment and would doubtless in a few years more 
 have been made president. But then came the 
 war and the meetings of the Association were 
 suspended. When they were resumed in 1866 
 I did not attend ; the embittered feelings engen- 
 dered by the war had not wholly abated, and 
 moreover I was too poor to afford the expense. 
 My membership therefore lapsed by default. 
 Soon after I moved to California, and seemed, 
 like Cortes, to have burned my ships. I was 
 practically cut off from intercourse with East- 
 ern scientific men and had to work alone. In 
 1881, without seeking on my part, I was elected 
 a fellow, and thereafter paid my dues regularly 
 
 * Bull. Geol. Soc. Am., ii, 323-330. 
 f Open Court, v, 2779-2783. 
 % Andover Rev., xvi, 1-11. 
 
 298 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 and received the Proceedings. Still I could not 
 attend the meetings, as the expense each time 
 would have been not less than two hundred and 
 fifty dollars. Finally, in 1891, just thirty years 
 after my last appearance at a meeting, I re- 
 ceived letters from some of the most prominent 
 members stating that if I would attend the meet- 
 ing at Washington in August, I would be made 
 president. The meeting was to be a very im- 
 portant one, for the International Geological 
 Congress was to meet at the same time and 
 place ; and as I had leave of absence for a year, 
 which I intended to spend in Europe, I deter- 
 mined to attend. I was not only elected Presi- 
 dent of the Association but also First Vice- 
 President of the American Committee of the 
 Geological Congress, and as the president, Pro- 
 fessor Newberry, was ill, it became my duty to 
 preside over the Congress, and, therefore, to 
 make an address welcoming the distinguished 
 geologists there assembled from all parts of the 
 world. Of this I knew nothing until I reached 
 "Washington, so had but two days in which to 
 prepare my address. I chose as my subject 
 The American Continent as a Geological Field, 
 and compared it in this respect with Europe, 
 drawing the attention of the foreign geologists 
 
 299 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 to its most striking characteristics and espe- 
 cially to the fact that geological problems are 
 here expressed in simpler terms than in Europe. 
 At the Congress I became well acquainted with 
 a number of foreign geologists whom I later met 
 in Europe, particularly Professor Hughes, Pro- 
 fessor Barrios, of Lille, and Professor Cadell, 
 of Scotland, who, with Professor Shaler and 
 myself, were guests for ten days or two weeks 
 at Mr. Gardner Hubbard's splendid country 
 home near Washington. 
 
 From here I went to New York and spent a 
 month in superintending the publication of a 
 new edition, the fourth, of my Elements of 
 Geology. My son Joe had just graduated and 
 had been made the first recipient of the Le Conte 
 Memorial Fellowship, which the alumni of the 
 University of California had established in 
 honor of my brother and myself. He inherits 
 a love for science, but his taste is for the mathe- 
 matical and physical rather than for the natural 
 sciences. From childhood he has delighted in 
 all kinds of mechanical contrivances, and when 
 but fourteen constructed without help a com- 
 plete steam-engine to run his lathe and scroll- 
 saw. He had determined to perfect himself in 
 electric engineering, and as our plant at Berke- 
 
 300 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 ley was not then complete I took liim to Cornell 
 and entered him as a graduate student there. 
 
 After my return to New York I went South 
 with my wife and daughter and for several 
 months visited my daughters there. On my 
 way to the North again I spent a week in Wash- 
 ington and lectured before the Philosophic So- 
 ciety on The Relation of Philosophy to Psy- 
 chology and to Physiology. While in New York 
 making arrangements for our European trip, I 
 was also invited to lecture before the Brooklyn 
 Ethical Association on The Race Problem in 
 the South. The lecture was one of a series on 
 social and political questions in relation to 
 ethics, published later in a volume entitled Man 
 and the State. The question was a delicate one, 
 but I spoke plainly from the scientific point of 
 view. The views I maintained that evening 
 were then unpopular, but are now acknowledged 
 almost universally by thinking men. Lincoln's 
 definition of an ideal government, one of the 
 people, for the people, and by the people, must 
 be modified; how becomes obvious if we intro- 
 duce the little word all. A rational government 
 must be of all the people and for all the people, 
 but not by all the people. It never has been and 
 never can be. 
 
 301 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 On the twenty-seventh of February, 1892, we 
 started for Europe in the steamer Werra, and 
 thirteen days later, after a very stormy passage, 
 landed at Genoa. This trip to Europe was an 
 important epoch in my life. Perhaps I should 
 have gone just after my marriage, as I was then 
 " foot-loose " and had sufficient income. I did 
 indeed offer to take my bride, but neither of us 
 then appreciated the importance of such a trip 
 and we did not go. After that, increasing 
 family, decreasing resources, and professional 
 duties made it more and more difficult, indeed 
 impossible. Now, when I was sixty-nine, the 
 Regents of the University again made it possi- 
 ble by generously giving me a year's leave of 
 absence with full salary. The advantages of 
 such a trip in youth and in age are very differ- 
 ent ; in youth the advantage is mainly the broad- 
 ening of the mind and character by a purely un- 
 conscious process, by new experiences; in age 
 the mind and character are better prepared to 
 take advantage of all sources of information. 
 I was, moreover, now well known by my writ- 
 ings, and could therefore become personally ac- 
 quainted with prominent men. 
 
 Our intention was to land in Italy and fol- 
 low the season northward. From Genoa we 
 
 302 
 
Mrs. Joseph Le Conte. 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 went to Rome, where we remained two weeks. 
 The Eternal City delighted us, not only for its 
 glorious associations, wonderful antiquities, and 
 splendors of art, ancient and modern, but be- 
 cause we found the people charming. There is 
 a certain freedom of manners and a beauty in 
 the women and children of the middle and lower 
 classes; even the beggar boys in their tatters 
 were free and buoyant, picturesque and beau- 
 tiful. The English and American resident 
 society is, moreover, delightful, being a picked 
 set of intelligent, and especially of artistic, men 
 and women. Such persons are everywhere 
 naturally free and unconventional, but these 
 characteristics seemed to me modified to a richer 
 color by the very air and sky of Italy. 
 
 I must here record my great obligations to 
 three American women, old friends then resi- 
 dent in Rome: Mrs. Terry, the sister of Mrs. 
 Julia Ward Howe and mother of Marion Craw- 
 ford, the successful novelist; Mrs. Carlton, a 
 painter, daughter of Mr. Petigru, the distin- 
 guished jurist of South Carolina, whom I knew 
 quite well ; and Mrs. Norman Lieber, widow of a 
 son of Dr. Francis Lieber, who was a professor 
 in the South Carolina College before the war. 
 This last family furnishes an example of the 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 dreadful tragedies of the war ; the two brothers, 
 Norman and Oscar — the latter State Geologist 
 of South Carolina and one of my most intimate 
 friends — were both killed, the one fighting for 
 the North, the other for the South. These 
 three women contributed much to the pleasure 
 of our stay in Rome, introducing us to several 
 delightful Italian families. I also visited the 
 studios of a number of artists, especially that 
 of Story. I do not pretend to be a connoisseur, 
 though I am an intense lover of art, but it seems 
 to me that some of the pieces of sculpture in 
 his studio have never been excelled. It is im- 
 possible to imagine a more nearly perfect ideal 
 representation of refined yet voluptuous beauty 
 than a statue of Cleopatra reclining. This 
 seemed to me a really wonderful masterpiece, 
 even the elastic softness of the skin being mar- 
 velously represented in the marble, the slightly 
 yellowish tint of which undoubtedly contributed 
 to the effect. 
 
 From Rome we went to Naples. The charm 
 here was not so much in the people, who did not 
 please me as much as the Romans did, as in the 
 scenery; the beautiful bay, with its bold, rocky 
 coast, picturesque islands, and grand volcanic 
 peak. I have often heard the Bay of San Fran- 
 
 304 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 cisco compared with, that of Naples, and surely 
 they challenge comparison as the two noblest in 
 the world. The scenery about the Bay of San 
 Francisco, the bold coast, the lofty mountains, 
 the noble islands, the great expanse of water, 
 and the Golden Gate, opening out on the vast 
 Pacific — these are as fine as, perhaps finer than, 
 the Bay of Naples. Seen at a distance, as from 
 Berkeley, the general effect is unsurpassable. 
 And yet there is a difference in favor of Na- 
 ples. What is it? It seems to me to be the 
 difference between a tideless and a tidal sea; 
 between the clear blue waters of the one and 
 the turbid waters of the other; between the 
 clean rock and pebble shores, against which 
 the lapping of the waves produces not even 
 the slightest milkiness in the one case, and 
 the mud-flat margins, in the other. To be sure, 
 these differences are not visible at a distance, 
 but the knowledge of them unconsciously 
 mingles with the general esthetic effect of the 
 whole. 
 
 At Naples I made a brief visit to the cele- 
 brated Zoological Station, and we spent several 
 days of delight at Sorrento and Capri, visiting 
 the Blue Grotto of course. Shall I ever forget 
 the glorious ride from Sorrento to Castellamare 
 21 305 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 and thence to Pompeii? Or the ascent of Vesu- 
 vius'? 
 
 After a week in Naples and vicinity we re- 
 turned to Rome for another week. Thence we 
 went to Florence, and enjoyed its incomparable 
 art-galleries and the sculptures of Michael An- 
 gelo and made a visit to the home of Galileo. 
 Our next stopping place was Venice, the en- 
 chanting, where we saw the glories of Titian, 
 Guido, Tintoret, and Veronese. Milan, with its 
 wonderful cathedral and great picture of The 
 Last Supper, by Leonardo, was next visited; 
 and from there we went, by way of Como, Lu- 
 gano, the St. Gothard Pass, and the exquisite 
 Lake Lucerne, to Zurich, where we remained a 
 week. The excellent university here and the 
 splendid Polytechnicum, perhaps the finest in 
 Europe, greatly interested me, and I met a 
 number of distinguished men, among them 
 Weber and Professor Heim. The Italian con- 
 sul here proved to be an old San Francisco 
 friend, and when I called upon him he actually 
 embraced me with joy ! 
 
 From Heidelberg, with its romantic castle, 
 nestled among the hills, we went down the Rhine 
 to Cologne. The scenery of the Rhine is very 
 fine, but is greatly enhanced by the picturesque 
 
 306 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 ruined castles and the traditions and legends 
 connected with them. In itself it is inferior to 
 that of the Columbia, the Fraser, or even the 
 Hudson. The wonderful cathedral of Cologne 
 is probably the finest in Europe, but its effect 
 is marred by its mean environment. In this re- 
 spect that of Milan is far finer. 
 
 After a few days in Cologne we went directly 
 to Paris. There, as in the places previously 
 mentioned, I saw whatever there was to be seen, 
 what tourists ordinarily see. It is unnecessary, 
 therefore, to dwell on these topics. What was 
 peculiar to me was my acquaintance with dis- 
 tinguished men. Among geologists I saw a 
 good deal of Gaudry and Boule, of the Jardin 
 des Plantes, De Margerie, of the Survey of 
 France, and Daubrde, the President of the Acad- 
 emy of Science. Professor Javal, the ophthal- 
 mologist of the Sorbonne, translator of Helm- 
 holtz's Physiological Optics, invited me to his 
 house to luncheon. On entering his study, I saw 
 lying on his study-table a copy of my book on 
 Sight, and he told me that he used it in his 
 teaching of physiological optics. I called his 
 attention to several points in which I differ fun- 
 damentally from Helmholtz, and he said that in 
 his opinion I was right in every case. As the 
 
 307 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 whole family spoke English, I spent a very de- 
 lightful day. 
 
 After spending the month of May in Paris, 
 we crossed the Channel to England. Ah! the 
 delight of hearing my mother tongue again! 
 It was like returning home. We remained in 
 London over a month, most of the time as 
 guests of Mr. De Friese, formerly a pupil of 
 mine in the University of California but now a 
 successful London attorney. The house in 
 which he lived belonged to Mr. Rider Haggard 
 but was leased to Professor Jebb, from whom 
 Mr. De Friese rented it. It was filled with me- 
 mentos of its former occupants as well as with 
 many curious things that Mr. De Friese himself 
 had brought from Turkey. 
 
 In London I made many delightful acquaint- 
 ances, especially among geologists. Professor 
 Prestwick, with whom I had corresponded and 
 exchanged books, had retired from the chair of 
 geology in Oxford, and invited us to visit him 
 at his home in Kent. We spent several days 
 here with the genial and kindly professor, still 
 full of life and of interest in science, though 
 nearly eighty, and his gentle and hospitable 
 wife, who was thoroughly in sympathy with her 
 husband's pursuits. Pie took me over his place, 
 
 308 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 an ideal home in the most beautiful part of 
 England, showing me with pride his fruit-trees 
 and his flowers. His house was filled with illus- 
 trations of geology, among them a collection of 
 Plateau implements that proved for the first 
 time the existence of man in the earliest glacial, 
 if not in preglacial, times. He gave me a few 
 specimens of these and they are now in the 
 Museum of the University of California. 
 
 Sir Archibald Geikie I frequently saw, both 
 in his study in Jermyn Street and at his home 
 in Cambridge Crescent. With Professor Judd 
 I attended a meeting of the Geological Society 
 and dined with the assembled geologists, becom- 
 ing acquainted with Professor Woodward, Wil- 
 frid H. Hudleston, and many others. Sir John 
 Lubbock was especially cordial, inviting me to a 
 reception at his house, where I met Lady Lub- 
 bock, and taking me to Parliament, where he 
 pointed out the distinguished members. 
 
 Sir Andrew Clark, to whom I presented a 
 card from Dr. Sayre, also received me with the 
 greatest cordiality. As soon as I appeared he 
 greeted me with the question, "Are you the 
 author of this book? " holding out my Evolu- 
 tion and its Relation to Religious Thought. 
 " Yes, sir." " Well, you see how carefully I 
 
 309 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 have read it," showing me the marginal annota- 
 tions. I was of course greatly gratified. 
 
 As Sir William McCormack was too ill to go 
 out, Mr. Croome Robertson, the editor of Mind, 
 urged me to waive all ceremony and call on him. 
 I found him most unpretentious, cordial, and 
 genial, though evidently suffering from a fatal 
 disease. 
 
 I dined with that famous assemblage of art- 
 ists and men of talent in every profession, the 
 Savage Club, and witnessed a most remarkable 
 exhibition of many kinds of skill and talent. 
 Sir James Gibbe presided, and much to my sur- 
 prise called on me to speak. 
 
 We spent a Sunday at the home of a 
 friend of our hosts at Richmond, about fif- 
 teen miles from London. The house was on 
 the banks of the Thames, and the lovely 
 grounds and the river crowded with pleasure 
 boats full of gaily attired people in holiday 
 spirit made one of the most charming pictures 
 I ever saw. 
 
 But perhaps the most delightful experiences 
 were those at Cambridge and Oxford. Profess- 
 or and Mrs. J. McKenney Hughes, whom I had 
 met at the Geological Congress at Washington, 
 entertained us for several days in Cambridge, 
 
 310 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 and we greatly enjoyed their charming hospi- 
 tality. Under the guidance of the professor I 
 saw the beautiful grounds and learned the work- 
 ings of the great University, and became ac- 
 quainted with Sir George Stokes, the Chancel- 
 lor, Professor Ewing, Professor Harker, and 
 Miss Lyell, sister of Sir Charles Lyell, the great 
 geologist. 
 
 Professor George Romanes, with whom I 
 had corresponded and exchanged publications 
 but whom I had never met, invited me to spend 
 a few days with him at his charming home in 
 Oxford. In spite of the fact that he was at the 
 time seriously threatened with the brain trou- 
 ble of which he soon after died, I found him 
 cheerful and genial, and on the day of my 
 arrival he invited several of his intimate friends 
 to meet me. I then became acquainted with Mr. 
 Gore, now Canon Gore, a man of remarkable 
 ability, editor of the celebrated book Lux Mundi 
 and author of the most important essays in it. 
 After dinner I walked over the university 
 grounds with him, and he took my breath away 
 by telling me that he thought so highly of my 
 book, Evolution and its Relation to Religious 
 Thought, to which Professor Romanes had 
 drawn his attention, that he used it in his 
 
 311 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 classes on that subject and in a few days would 
 examine them on it. 
 
 Professor Romanes himself was obliged to 
 be very quiet, but his wife was full of energy 
 and spirit and carried me everywhere and 
 showed me everything about Oxford. She took 
 me to see the venerable and distinguished phys- 
 iologist, Sir John Burdon-Sanderson, and then 
 insisted on my accompanying her, dressed as I 
 was, to a garden party at one of the colleges for 
 women, where I met many charming people, 
 among them Sir John Evans, the anthropologist. 
 I also dined in the hall of Christ Church with 
 the dons, but found the dinner formal and 
 rather stiff. 
 
 About the first of July we left London for 
 Edinburgh, visiting on the way the quaint little 
 town of Stratford on Avon, peculiarly interest- 
 ing to me because of my unbounded admiration 
 and love for Shakespeare ; the still quainter and 
 less changed Warwick and its wonderfully beau- 
 tiful castle; Kenilworth, where every one that 
 loves Walter Scott will endeavor to find traces 
 of the magnificence that he has celebrated ; Mel- 
 rose, with its fine ruined abbey; and Abbots- 
 ford, the home of Scott. 
 
 After several days in beautiful Edinburgh, 
 312 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 where I particularly admired the view of the 
 castle from across the gorge, having seen every- 
 thing worth seeing, we went on to Stirling, 
 and thence to Glasgow by the Trossachs and 
 Lochs Lomond and Katrine, a charming trip. 
 
 In Glasgow I went at once to call upon Sir 
 "William Thomson, whom I had met in Philadel- 
 phia at the Centennial Exposition. "Is Sir 
 William Thomson at home 1 ?" I asked of the 
 splendid footman that appeared in answer to 
 my ring. " Lord Kelvin, if you please," he an- 
 swered. " No, sir ; he has gone to Dublin to at- 
 tend the tercentennial celebration there." Ah 
 well, thought I, then I shall see him there. I 
 visited the University of Glasgow, but as I had 
 no letters of introduction became acquainted 
 with no one save the Curator of the Museum. 
 
 From Glasgow we went to " Auld Ayr, wham 
 ne'er a town surpasses," and thence via Stran- 
 raer, across the Channel to Belfast. We 
 arrived at Dublin too late for the celebration, 
 so I again missed seeing Lord Kelvin. But 
 walking across the campus of Trinity I met an 
 old friend from home, Professor Wm. Carey 
 Jones, the delegate from the University of Cali- 
 fornia to the celebration. 
 
 In New York I had met an Irish lady, Mrs. 
 313 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 O'Connell, daughter of Bianconi, the great bene- 
 factor of Ireland, who introduced good roads, 
 jaunting cars, and stages all over the country, 
 and wife of a nephew of Daniel O'Connell, the 
 Liberator, a most cultured woman, full of genu- 
 ine Irish wit and humor. She had most cor- 
 dially invited me to visit her in Ireland, and 
 when she learned that we were in London wrote 
 at once fixing a time for our visit. From Dub- 
 lin, therefore, we went by rail to Gould's Cross, 
 near Cashell, the capital of the Kingdom of Ire- 
 land, and from there in her carriage to Long- 
 fields, her home. She and her son received us 
 with the most whole-souled hospitality and in- 
 sisted on our staying a week instead of the two 
 or three days that we had intended. Long- 
 fields is a typical Irish estate, charmingly situ- 
 ated in a bend of the river Suir. The family 
 was Irish of the Irish, so not only lived on the 
 place and managed the estate but took a deep 
 interest in the intellectual and moral welfare of 
 the tenantry. Though but twenty, Mrs. O'Con- 
 nell's son had organized a temperance society 
 among the tenants, and as an example to them, 
 though wine was on the table every day and 
 drunk freely by every one else, including the 
 visiting priests, he never touched it. He also 
 
 314 
 
FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 got up lectures' and plays for them in a barn 
 rudely fitted up for the purpose, and they in 
 turn serenaded us with their brass band and 
 formally conducted us to our seats at a per- 
 formance. The music was discordant enough 
 surely, but we enjoyed it as the spontaneous 
 offering of a kindly spirit. In company with 
 Mrs. O'Connell we visited the cabins of the ten- 
 ants and chatted with them, everywhere seeing 
 evidences of the kindly and even affectionate 
 relation that existed between the tenantry and 
 the landlord. If all estates were managed in 
 this way, there would be no Irish question. 
 
 Leaving this delightful place and these 
 charming people with great reluctance, we went 
 to Killarney. The beautiful lakes there richly 
 deserve their reputation, the intricate com- 
 plexity of outline giving them an inexpressible 
 charm. The freshness and greenness here were 
 simply unsurpassable, even in the Emerald Isle 
 itself. We saw the lakes under peculiarly 
 favorable conditions, the days being fine but 
 changeable, fitful, and capricious. After every 
 light shower the sun would again break forth 
 and flood the scene with glory. The charm of 
 the lakes as I saw them seemed to me a fitting 
 emblem of the charm of the Irish character. 
 
 315 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 Having seen the Italian, Swiss, Scotch, and 
 Irish lakes, and having camped for weeks among 
 the mountain lakes of California, I may now 
 briefly compare them. All are beautiful in the 
 highest degree ; but the beauty of the Italian and 
 Swiss is characterized by splendor, magnifi- 
 cence, and grandeur ; that of the Scotch by wild- 
 ness and picturesqueness ; and that of the Irish 
 by simple, unalloyed, gladsome, satisfying 
 beauty alone. The scenery and lakes of the 
 Coast Range of California are very similar to 
 those of Scotland and fully equal; we find 
 here the same bosky hillsides about the lakes. 
 Though artificial and on a smaller scale, Lakes 
 San Andreas, Pilarcitos, and Crystal Springs, 
 in San Mateo County, within twenty miles of 
 San Francisco, are equal to anything I saw in 
 Scotland. But the lakes of the Sierra are dif- 
 ferent from all the others, and I know not how 
 to characterize them save by saying that their 
 beauty is enhanced by the absolute solitude and 
 unbroken silence. 
 
 From Killarney we went to Cork and 
 Queenstown, the beggars of which places were 
 the only signs of the poverty and misery of the 
 Irish people that we saw, and took the steamer 
 City of Paris for New York. 
 
 316 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY; SECOND VISIT TO EUROPE; 
 SUMMARY 
 
 We arrived in New York in the early part of 
 August, after a delightfully smooth trip that 
 broke the record for time. After presiding at 
 the meeting of the American Association for 
 the Advancement of Science, at Eochester, I 
 went directly home. There I found my wife 
 and daughter, who on their return from Europe 
 had visited my daughters in the South, and my 
 son. Joe had received the degree of M. M. E. 
 from Cornell and had been appointed assistant 
 in mechanical engineering in the University of 
 California. Worn out with overwork he had 
 come directly home from Ithaca, without await^ 
 ing our arrival from Europe, and had gone into 
 camp in the Sierra, and was now completely re- 
 stored to health and vigor. Born in California, 
 he is every inch a Californian, thinking there is 
 no place equal to his native State. 
 
 317 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 In the winter of 1892-93 I made a trip to 
 southern California, and gave courses of Uni- 
 versity Extension lectures in Los Angeles and 
 San Diego on Glaciers and the Glacial Epoch 
 in California. On the way south I stopped at 
 Fresno and lectured before the Teachers' Con- 
 vention on The Relation of Organic Evolution 
 to Human Progress, which lecture was pub- 
 lished in the Pacific Coast Teacher.* 
 
 The twenty-sixth of February, 1893, was my 
 seventieth birthday, and in honor of the occa- 
 sion the Academic Senate of the University 
 gave me a dinner in the Maple Room of the Pal- 
 ace Hotel, San Francisco. There was a very 
 large attendance, including several distin- 
 guished visitors, and a number of complimen- 
 tary addresses were made. I was sincerely 
 touched by this evidence of the affection of my 
 colleagues. 
 
 In June I went on a camping trip to the 
 Tosemite with my son. I was far from well, 
 and did not improve in the valley. Over three- 
 score and ten, I felt that my life was spent, and 
 thought that surely this was the last time I 
 should see the Yosemite. Ill and low-spirited, 
 
 * II, 131-139. 
 
 318 
 
SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY 
 
 I rode about alone, taking leave with tears of the 
 splendid cliffs and glorious waterfalls as of 
 dearest friends. But as a matter of fact I 
 visited the valley several times after this. 
 
 Early in August I went to Madison, Wiscon- 
 . sin, and there gave my presidential address be- 
 fore the American Association for the Advance- 
 | ment of Science. My subject was Theories of 
 • Mountain Origin, and the address was published 
 | not only in the Proceedings * of the Association 
 but also in the Journal of Geology, f On return- 
 I ing to Berkeley I wrote a memoir of my brother 
 John that was published in 1894 in the third 
 volume of Biographical Memoirs of the Na- 
 tional Academy of Science.^ 
 
 In the spring of 1894 occurred the Midwinter 
 Exposition at San Francisco, and I was invited 
 to address one of the congresses connected with 
 it. I spoke on The Theory of Evolution and 
 Social Progress, and brought out some impor- 
 tant original views that, when published in the 
 Monist * in July of the following year, attracted 
 considerable attention. After again spending 
 the summer in the Yosemite, but this time at 
 the hotel, I attended the meeting of the Amer- 
 
 * XLII, 1-27. f I, 543-573. % Pp. 369-393. • V, 481-500. 
 
 319 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ican Association for the Advancement of Sci- 
 ence, at Brooklyn, N. Y., in August. 
 
 In this year I was elected an Honorary Mem- 
 ber of the American Institute of Mining Engi- 
 neers. Professor Rossiter Raymond wrote in- 
 viting me to close the discussion on Professor 
 Posepny's Genesis of Ore Deposits, to which all 
 of the most distinguished practical geologists of 
 the country had contributed, and stating that the 
 Institute desired to elect me an honorary mem- 
 ber but was barred because I had never con- 
 tributed to their proceedings. I accepted the 
 invitation, and my paper having been published 
 in the twenty-fourth volume of their Transac- 
 tions,* was duly elected. 
 
 In 1895 I wrote three papers. By invitation 
 I went to Denver and addressed the National 
 Educational Association on The Effect of the 
 Theory of Evolution on Education, which ad- 
 dress was published in the Proceedings of the 
 Association f for that year, and reprinted in 
 the Educational Review.:]: The Philosophical 
 Union of the University of California had been 
 studying The Conception of God, by Professor 
 Josiah Royce, an alumnus of the University, 
 
 * Pp. 996-1006. f Pp. 149-161. % X, 121-136. 
 
 320 
 
SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY 
 
 and the year's work was closed by a general pub- 
 lic meeting at which addresses were made by 
 Professor Eoyce himself, Professor Howison, 
 Professor Mezes, of the University of Texas, 
 also an alumnus of the University, and myself. 
 These addresses, after having been published in 
 pamphlet form by the Union for its members, 
 were enlarged somewhat and published as a 
 book by The Macmillan Company. I also wrote 
 by invitation a memoir of Professor Dana that 
 was read at the December meeting of the Geo- 
 logical Society of America, at which meeting I 
 was elected president of the Society. The 
 memoir was published in the Bulletins of the 
 Society in 1896,* and was, with my permission, 
 incorporated by Dr. D. C. Gilman in his life of 
 Dana, 1899, as a suitable estimate of his scien- 
 tific work. 
 
 In January, 1896, I gave up my undergradu- 
 ate class and henceforth gave only special, for 
 the most part graduate, courses in geology and 
 comparative physiology. I did this partly be- 
 cause my class had become so large — over four 
 hundred in 1895 — that it took me nearly a month 
 to look over and grade their examination papers, 
 
 * VII, 461-474. 
 22 321 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 partly that the young men under me, Professors 
 Lawson and Merriam, might have a better 
 chance. On my own account I regretted the 
 change more than I can express, for I deeply 
 loved my undergraduate class. Their eager 
 faces always inspired me to do my best and they 
 had shown me so much real affection that I felt 
 that I should miss them infinitely. But, on the 
 other hand, I could now do something more 
 than elementary teaching, and hoped to be able 
 to inspire my students with the true spirit of in- 
 vestigation. 
 
 It was in this year that the students gener- 
 ally, but especially my individual pupils, began 
 to recognize my birthday by decorating my lec- 
 ture-table and giving me some valuable present, 
 which this year took the form of a fine portrait 
 of my old master Agassiz. Six successive years 
 now they have done this, until it has become 
 a regular university celebration. This year 
 (1901) I thought they would forget it, as I was 
 on the other side of the continent, three thou- 
 sand miles away ; but just as I was about to sit 
 down to the birthday turkey in Macon, Georgia, 
 I received a telegram of congratulation from the 
 students of the University. I was intensely 
 gratified, but thought of course nothing more 
 
 322 
 
SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY 
 
 was possible; but on my return to Berkeley I 
 found awaiting me their annual gift, a really 
 valuable work of art.* The many evidences of 
 affection that I have received from the students, 
 the faculty, the regents, and all the people of 
 the State have greatly endeared the University 
 of California and the people to me. There is no 
 place like California! 
 
 The year 1896 was an especially prolific one 
 with me. In the spring I wrote as my contri- 
 bution to the discussion of Professor Watson's 
 Comte, Mill, and Spencer, which the Philosoph- 
 ical Union was studying, a paper on The Rela- 
 tion of Biology to Philosophy. This was also 
 read at Greenacre and Jacksonville in August, 
 at Boston and Cambridge in October, and at 
 Columbia in December; and was finally pub- 
 lished, but without my permission, in the Arena 
 for April, 1897. f This was a grievous wrong 
 to me, particularly as the sense of the article 
 was marred by some bad typographical errors ; 
 but I do not think that the editor of the Arena 
 
 * On the recurrence of Professor Le Conte's birthday in 1902, 
 the lecture-table was again decorated with flowers by the stu- 
 dents and memorial exercises were held. It is the intention to 
 hold annual memorial exercises on that day for the members of 
 the University that have died during the preceding year. 
 
 f XVII, 549-567. 
 
 323 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 was responsible for it. A little later in the 
 spring I wrote an article entitled From Animal 
 to Man, in which I tried to point out the essen- 
 tial differences ; and published it in the Monist, 
 for April, 1896.* 
 
 In the summer I attended the meeting of the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Science, at Buffalo, and presided over the Geo- 
 logical Society of America. The meeting was 
 rather informal as the papers were by agree- 
 ment read before the Geological Section of the 
 Association, but was notable because in honor 
 of Professor James Hall on the completion of 
 his sixtieth consecutive year of work on the 
 geology of New York. Many addresses were 
 made, including one by myself, and published in 
 Science f in the following November. The re- 
 mainder of August I spent in New York super- 
 intending new editions of my books, Sight and 
 The Elements of Geology, and early in Septem- 
 ber set sail for England with my wife and 
 daughter Caroline. 
 
 The special purpose of this trip to England 
 was to attend the meeting at Liverpool of the 
 British Association for the Advancement of 
 
 * VI, 356-381. f N. S., iv, 698-699. 
 
 324 
 
SECOND VISIT TO EUEOPE 
 
 Science, to which I had been especially invited. 
 I met many old friends and made a number of 
 new ones, among them Rev. John "Watson (Ian 
 Maclaren), the Rev. Mr. Armstrong, Sir H. 
 Roscoe, with whom I had a long talk on educa- 
 tion in the United States, and Mr. and Mrs. 
 Bouloir. In London also I met many friends, 
 though many others, among them Professor 
 Hughes and Sir John Lubbock, were unfortu- 
 nately out of town. Sir Archibald Geikie was 
 again very cordial and kind, as was Professor 
 Woodward, of the British Museum of Natural 
 History. Of Herbert Spencer, who invited me 
 to luncheon at his home, I saw much. I there 
 met Mr. Carnegie, who introduced me to the 
 Athenaeum and had me made a member during 
 my stay in London. 
 
 Twice, once by myself and once with my 
 family, I visited Mr. Pearsall Smith at his coun- 
 try house near Haslemere, Surrey. Mr. Smith, 
 who is an American, is a remarkable man. In 
 early life he was a most wonderful lay-revival- 
 ist, famous throughout America and Europe, 
 even kings and queens seeking his company and 
 honoring him. A man of genial, sympathetic 
 nature, warm feelings, and vivid imagination, but 
 also of clear, vigorous mind, he began, as might 
 
 325 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 have been expected, to suspect his vivid visions 
 as he grew older, and finally ended in utter 
 skepticism. I talked much and earnestly with 
 him, and, like a drowning man at a plank, he 
 caught at my views with a joy and love that 
 were overpowering. He actually hugged me 
 and almost wept when we parted, and after my 
 return to America continued to write express- 
 ing his gratitude and love. His place is in one 
 of the most beautiful parts of England, a favor- 
 ite summer resort of Tennyson, Tyndal, and 
 Harrison. The country is diversified and in 
 part covered with primeval forests of great ex- 
 tent, which Mr. Smith asserts are the very ones 
 in which Gurth and Wamba fed the hogs of 
 Cedric the Saxon ! 
 
 I was obliged to make my stay in England 
 short that I might be present at the sesquicen- 
 tennial celebration at Princeton in October, 
 when the name and legal status of the institu- 
 tion were changed from the College of New Jer- 
 sey to Princeton University. It was made a 
 great occasion, with ceremonies, parades, and 
 addresses. Distinguished men from all parts 
 of the world were honored with degrees, and I 
 was given that of LL. D. The degree has be- 
 come so common that I care little for it per se, 
 
 326 
 
SECOND VISIT TO EUROPE 
 
 but given under these circumstances it certainly 
 was a distinguished honor. 
 
 After the celebration I visited Cambridge as 
 the guest of a former pupil in the University of 
 California, Professor Josiah Royce; and spent 
 a delightful fortnight meeting many old friends, 
 among the number Mrs< Agassiz and Alexander 
 Agassiz, Mrs. Asa Gray, and James Peirce. 
 While here I read my paper on The Relation 
 of Biology to Philosophy at a meeting of the 
 Cambridge Conference at the home of Mrs. Ole 
 Bull, and spent one evening discussing evolu- 
 tion and its relation to religion with the pro- 
 fessors and students of the Divinity School, and 
 another dining with " the Berkeley colony," 
 some twenty or twenty-five of my former stu- 
 dents in California. Under the guidance of 
 Mrs. Geo. H. Palmer, a former president of 
 Wellesley, I visited that college and was hospi- 
 tably entertained by the president and faculty. 
 It is one of the most charming places I ever 
 saw, with extensive grounds, thick woods, beau- 
 tiful lakes, and fine buildings — a very paradise. 
 From Cambridge I went for a short visit to Bar 
 Harbor as the guest of Mrs. Mary Ward Dorr. 
 
 After attending the meetings of the National 
 Academy of Science in New York in November, 
 
 327 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 I went South, whither my wife and daughter 
 had preceded me. Soon after Christmas, how- 
 ever, I was in "Washington to preside at the 
 meeting of the Geological Society of America. 
 My address on Earth Crust Movements and 
 Their Causes was not only published in Sci- 
 ence * and as a Bulletin f by the Society, but 
 was selected with a number of distinguished 
 papers to be reprinted in the Report of the 
 Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institu- 
 tion for 18964 
 
 Immediately after this meeting I returned 
 South and Mrs. Le Conte and I celebrated our 
 golden wedding in my daughter's house at 
 Scottsboro, only two miles from Midway, where 
 we were married. Joe having come on from 
 California, we had our celebration in the pres- 
 ence of all our children and grandchildren, as 
 well as of many friends from Milledgeville and 
 Macon. It was a happy occasion for all, but 
 most of all for my dear wife and me. On the 
 very day of the celebration we were made still 
 happier by the arrival of telegrams of greeting 
 and congratulation and of presents from the 
 regents, the faculty, and the students of the 
 
 * N. S., v, 321-330. f VIII, 113-126. . \ Pp. 233-244. 
 
 328 
 
SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY 
 
 University of California. But what can I say 
 of the great reception that followed our return, 
 when three or four thousand people crowded 
 into the Hopkins Art Building of the University 
 to welcome us home? There was of course the 
 usual hand-shaking and speechifying, and we 
 were presented with a beautiful golden loving- 
 cup. This splendid reception had been ar- 
 ranged by the alumni of the University, and 
 was all the more gratifying to me because given 
 not to me alone but to my dear good wife as well. 
 And, as if this was not enough, the faculty gave 
 us a splendid dinner! I do not relate these 
 things in any spirit of boastfulness or vanity; 
 on the contrary, they make me feel really 
 humble. 
 
 The summer of 1897 I spent in the Yosemite 
 once more with my family, my son and daughter 
 camping and my wife and I staying at the hotel. 
 I joined the campers for a while and made a 
 very enjoyable trip of three or four days to 
 Clouds' Rest and the Little Yosemite. Is this 
 the last time I shall behold these marvels, the 
 very last? "We shall see. 
 
 In 1898 I published a new and revised edi- 
 tion of my Compend of Geology; delivered an 
 address on Charter Day on The True Idea of a 
 
 329 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 University; and contributed my share to the 
 Philosophical Union's discussion of Professor 
 James's The Will to Believe, by reading a paper 
 on his chapter on Keflex Function and Theism. 
 My Charter Day address was printed in the 
 University Chronicle,* and the latter part was 
 reprinted in the Monist f under the title A Note 
 on the Religious Significance of Science. 
 
 The summer of 1898 and that of the follow- 
 ing year I devoted to the care of my daughter, 
 who was seriously ill with nervous prostration. 
 I made no long trips, merely taking my wife and 
 daughter into Sonoma County and into the 
 Santa Cruz mountains for a few weeks. 
 , During 1899 I published in the Journal of 
 
 /Geology % a paper that I regard as one of my 
 most important, that on The Ozarkian and its 
 Significance in Theoretical Geology. It gathered 
 up many thoughts that had long been germinat- 
 ing in my mind and had ripened and taken defi- 
 nite shape during my lectures to a graduate 
 class in geology. In January and February, 
 1900, 1 published in the Popular Science Month- 
 ly tt a popular article entitled A Century of 
 
 * I, 3-19. | VII, 525-544. 
 
 t X, 161-166. * LVI, 431-443, 546-556. 
 
 330 
 
SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY 
 
 Geology, in which I briefly traced the history 
 of the evolution of geological thought. 
 
 I had thought my camping days were over, 
 and had taken an affectionate leave of the grand 
 scenes of the high Sierra. But from time to 
 time the yearning for camp life comes upon me, 
 and as Joe was preparing for a camping trip in 
 the King's River canon, which I had never 
 seen, he urged me to accompany him. I was 
 now seventy-seven, but was in good health and 
 spirits, so determined to try it. Such camps 
 have always renewed my life and this was no 
 exception. I was in camp six weeks, part of the 
 time at an altitude of eleven thousand feet — I 
 even reached Kearsarge Pass, twelve thousand 
 feet — and was in perfect health all the time. 
 As Joe is the prince of campers, we lived well ; 
 and I never enjoyed a camping trip more than 
 this one. Is this my last, my very last 1 ? I sup- 
 pose so. On my return I wrote an account of 
 the trip, which was published, with reproduc- 
 tions of photographs by my son, in the October, 
 1900, number of Sunset.* 
 
 During the summer the regents again voted 
 me leave of absence for a year, this time that I 
 
 * III, 275-285. 
 
 331 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 might be present at and take part in the deliber- 
 ations and discussions of the international con- 
 gresses that were to meet in Paris in this closing' 
 year of the century. I had been invited to meet 
 with the Geological, Mining, Zoological, Psy- 
 chological, Geographical, and Educational Con- 
 gresses ; and was especially anxious to meet the 
 assembled geologists. But at the last moment, 
 when I had engaged my steamship tickets and 
 made all preparations to go, the condition of my 
 daughter, whose illness has been mentioned, 
 compelled me to give up the idea. In Septem- 
 ber, however, as she was much better, my wife 
 and I went East with the intention of crossing 
 the Atlantic. But in New York I was taken ill 
 with la grippe, and was in the hospital for a 
 month with a slight fever and a severe bronchial 
 cough. As soon as I was able I went to the 
 home of my daughter in Columbia, South 
 Carolina, and there quickly and completely 
 recovered. I spent the winter in Columbia, 
 Scottsboro, and Macon with my children, grand- 
 children, and great-grandchildren, and really re- 
 newed my youth in the delights of my love for 
 them. As I was none the worse for my illness, 
 I decided to go to Europe in the spring. But 
 Mrs. Le Conte yearned for her home and the 
 
 332 
 
SUMMARY 
 
 children in California, and I began to perceive 
 that she would not be happy during a visit to 
 Europe. I therefore reluctantly brought her 
 back home, arriving on the third of March, 
 1901. So here I am again. I still hope to fin- 
 ish my year of absence in Europe, but I know 
 not. My son is to marry in June and much de- 
 sires that I should be present at his wedding. 
 
 And now, looking back on a long life of in- 
 cessant activity, what have I done of value to 
 the world! what have I added to human 
 thought? what influences for good may I hope 
 to leave behind me? 
 
 I. — In Science, and touching only the most 
 important points : 
 
 (a) My paper in 1859 on The Correlation of 
 Physical, Chemical, and Vital Force gave, I 
 think, both impulse and greater definiteness to 
 scientific thought on that subject. Carpenter in 
 the last edition of his Physiology gives me 
 credit for distinct advance on this subject. 
 
 (6) My researches on the phenomena of bin- 
 ocular vision, I am sure did clear up the thought 
 in this field. I claim, and have been generally 
 accorded, the credit of several original thoughts, 
 which have remained a permanent possession of 
 science: (1) The demonstration of the real na- 
 
 333 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 ture of the horopter; (2) The demonstration of 
 the true nature of the theory of binocular per- 
 spective; (3) The demonstration of certain fun- 
 damental physical phenomena in binocular vi- 
 sion, and the devising of a new mode of dia- 
 grammatic representation based thereon. These 
 phenomena had been observed by some, but not 
 understood. Their explanation had been 
 hinted at by others, but never before clearly 
 brought out; (4) The explanation, for the 
 first time, of certain peculiarities of phantom 
 planes. 
 
 (c) In Geology, I believe some real substan- 
 tial advance in science was made in my series of 
 papers; (1) on the structure and origin of 
 mountain ranges; (2) on the genesis of metal- 
 liferous veins; (3) especially in that on critical 
 periods in the history of the earth; (4) on the 
 demonstration of the Ozarkian, or better, the 
 Sierran epoch, as one of great importance in the 
 history of the earth. I might mention several 
 others that I believe are of prime importance, 
 but I am willing to stand by these. 
 
 (d) In Biology, my views on glycogeny, 
 although not yet certain, have undoubtedly con- 
 tributed to clearness of scientific thought on 
 that important subject. 
 
 334 
 
SUMMARY 
 
 II. — In Philosophy. 
 
 I look back with especial pleasure on my 
 writings on evolution. I lay no claim to the 
 discovery of new facts bearing on the theory of 
 evolution, but only to have cleared up its nature 
 and scope and especially to have shown its true 
 relation to religious thought. It is well to stop 
 a moment to show the roles of different thinkers 
 in the advance on this subject. Leaving out of 
 consideration mere vague philosophic specula- 
 tions, like those of ancient philosophers and of 
 Swedenborg in more modern times, I would say 
 that the role of Lamarck was to introduce evo- 
 lution as a scientific theory; that of Darwin to 
 present the theory in such wise as to make it 
 acceptable to and accepted by the scientific 
 mind ; that of Huxley to fight the battles of evo- 
 lution and to win its acceptance by the intelli- 
 gent popular mind ; that of Spencer to general- 
 ize it into a universal law of nature, thereby 
 making it a philosophy as well as a scientific 
 theory. Finally, it was left to American think- 
 ers to show that a materialistic implication is 
 wholly unwarranted, that evolution is entirely 
 consistent with a rational theism and with other 
 fundamental religious beliefs. My own work 
 has been chiefly in this direction. In my lec- 
 
 335 
 
JOSEPH LE CONTE'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 
 tures in 1872 on Religion and Science, I might 
 be called a reluctant evolutionist, yet even then, 
 in the sixteenth chapter of the book, I tried to 
 show the mode of origin of the spirit of man 
 from the psyche of animals by a process of evo- 
 lution. In a few years, however, I was an evo- 
 lutionist, thorough and enthusiastic. Enthusi- 
 astic, not only because it is true, and all truth 
 is the image of God in the human reason, but 
 also because of all the laws of nature it is by 
 far the most religious, that is, the most in ac- 
 cord with religious philosophic thought. It is, 
 indeed, glad tidings of great joy which shall be 
 to all peoples. Woe is me, if I preach not the 
 Gospel. Literally, it can be shown that all the 
 apparent irreligious and materialistic implica- 
 tions of science are reversed by this last child 
 of science, or rather this daughter of the mar- 
 riage of science and philosophy. During all my 
 life I have striven earnestly to show this. My 
 book on Evolution and its Relation to Religious 
 Thought is the embodiment of the result of 
 these strivings, although I believe that if I 
 wrote it again I could add much to the argu- 
 ment. I began this line of thought in 1871, and 
 believe, and therefore claim, that I was the 
 pioneer in this reaction against the materialistic 
 
 336 
 
SUMMARY 
 
 and irreligious implication of the doctrine of 
 evolution. I look with greater pleasure on this 
 than on anything else that I have done. At first 
 I suffered some, not much, obloquy on the part 
 of the extreme orthodox people, but I have lived 
 to see this pass away, and all intelligent clergy- 
 men coming to my position. 
 
 All, or nearly all, of my philosophic writings 
 are more or less connected with the doctrine of 
 evolution, and I regard these as among the most 
 important of my writings. Indeed one of my 
 friends thinks that the best and most permanent 
 that I have done is in the domain of philosophy 
 rather than in that of science proper. But he 
 is a philosopher; perhaps my scientific friends 
 think differently. 
 
 a) 
 
 THE END 
 
 23 337 
 
PROF. JOSEPH LE CONTE'S BOOKS. 
 
 The Comparative Physiology and Morphology 
 of Animals. 
 
 Illustrated. i2mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 The work of Darwin on the derivation of species and the descent of man 
 awakened a new interest in the lower animals, and furnished additional evidence 
 of their close kinship with ourselves. A fresh field of study was thus opened 
 up, embracing the likenesses and differences of action as well as structure found 
 throughout the animal kingdom. In this work Professor Le Conte gives us, 
 in his well-known clear and simple style and with the aid of numerous illustra- 
 tions, an interesting outline of these similarities and variations of function as 
 displayed among the various classes of animals from the lowest to the highest, 
 man included. 
 
 Religion and Science. 
 
 A Series of Sunday Lectures on the Relation of Natural and 
 Revealed Religion, or the Truths revealed in Nature and Scripture. 
 l2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 Elements of Geology. 
 
 A Text-Book for Colleges and for the General Reader. With 
 new Plates, new Illustrations, new Matter, fully revised to date. 
 8vo. Cloth, $4.00. 
 
 Sight. 
 
 An Exposition of the Principles of Monocular and Binocular 
 Vision. With Illustrations. Second edition. No. 31, Inter- 
 national Scientific Series. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 Evolution and its Relation to Religious Thought 
 
 Revised edition. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
"THE BOOK OF THE YEAR/' 
 
 Life and Letters of Thomas Henry 
 Huxley. 
 
 By his Son, Leonard Huxley. In two volumes. 
 Illustrated. 8vo. Cloth, $5.00 net. 
 
 " This very complete revelation of the character and work ol 
 a man who must be regarded as one of the forces which gave 
 character to the nineteenth century will be welcomed by a far 
 wider circle of readers than that which is interested in Huxley's 
 strictly scientific researches. . . . These two richly interesting 
 volumes are sure to be widely read." — London Times. 
 
 " It ' goes without saying ' what precious freight was carried 
 by Huxley's letters. . . . These two delightful volumes." — . 
 London Chronicle. 
 
 " Huxley's life was so full, so active, so many-sided, in touch 
 with such a number of interesting people, that this work appeals 
 to all sorts and conditions of men. . . . An admirably written 
 biography." — London Standard. 
 
 "His letters are a self-revelation of the man, his work, his 
 ambitions, his trials, his views of religion, his philosophy, his 
 public activity and domestic happiness. . . . Whoso reads these 
 volumes will feel that he knows better a man worth knowing, 
 and the number who will read them will be great." — London 
 Telegraph. 
 
 "Huxley's career makes a wonderful story." — London 
 Mail. 
 
 " Mr. Leonard Huxley has given the world many extremely 
 valuable and interesting letters, all characteristic, and he has con- 
 nected them by a well-written consecutive narrative which is 
 sufficient to weave them together." — London News. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
44 THE FIRST WOMAN OF FRANCE/' 
 
 The Romance of My Childhood and Youth. 
 
 By Madame Edmond Adam (Juliette Lamber). Photo- 
 gravure portrait. i2mo. Cloth, gilt top, $1.40 net. 
 
 " The book is really a romance of French history for a century. 
 It begins with the extraordinary career of Mile. Lamber's grand- 
 mother, who had a profound influence upon her early life, and 
 whose love story is as fine as any that novelist ever imagined. 
 And as to herself, it is such a revelation of development of char- 
 acter and conduct as nobody but a Frenchwoman could possibly 
 write." — The New York World. 
 
 "A curious and romantic story of a curious and romantic 
 French family, related with sympathetic candor." — Philadelphia 
 Public Ledger. 
 
 " Such a clear, precise style that the resulting picture in our 
 minds is as distinct as it is full of color and vividness." — The 
 New York Outlook. 
 
 " She has made clear the conflicting' emotions that helped to 
 form her character and shape her ambitions." — New York Times 
 Saturday Reviezu. 
 
 " Apart from its vivacity and dramatic qualities, the book is 
 extraordinarily interesting as showing, through a personal medium, 
 the forces and dreams that met together in France in those days 
 for the creation of the new socialism." — New York Independent. 
 
 " Nothing more pathetic, more unlike the ordinary, and more 
 picturesque can be found in biography." — Chicago Record-Herald. 
 
 "A delightful picture of French family life." — The Booklovers 
 Bulletin. 
 
 "This marvelous autobiography." — Cleveland Leader. 
 
 " Witty, full of life, and brilliant." — Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 " She has told the story as only a brilliant Frenchwoman can." 
 — Baltimore Herald. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
"The Most Remarkable Autobiography/' 
 
 My Life in Many States and in Foreign Lands. 
 
 Written in the Mills Hotel, in my Seventy-fourth Year. 
 By George Francis Train. Illustrated, nmo. Cloth, 
 $1.25 net ; postage, 12 cents additional. 
 
 " Positively fascinating. His life has been one of stupendous 
 commercial and important financial undertakings." — Boston 
 Times. 
 
 " One of the most picturesque figures ever known in the his- 
 tory of America, and Americans are the most picturesque of all 
 modern peoples." — New York Herald. 
 
 " If his career were published as fiction, every one would con- 
 sider it so improbable as to be ridiculous." — Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 " The strangest man in the world has written his autobiography 
 — probably the most remarkable autobiography ever written." — 
 New York World. 
 
 " A tale that transcends in interest all the remarkable tales that 
 were ever woven out of the silver threads of fiction or the golden 
 threads of truth, putting to the blush most of the novels and all 
 the books of personal narrative that have ever been written." — 
 Philadelphia Item. 
 
 " A remarkable story of a remarkable life, the amazing facts 
 of a career without a parallel for daring and eccentricity." — 
 Tacoma Ledger. 
 
 "This book would be a severe test of the reader's credulity 
 were the things related not all matters of actual history."— -Ameri- 
 can Review of Reviews. 
 
 " It reads like a whole bunch of romances and melodrama and 
 comedies and tragedies rolled into one. A human document of 
 a rare kind." — Providence News. 
 
 " It is the story of a man absolutely fearless of consequences, 
 of high ideals, and a genius for taking hazards of new fortunes.'' 
 — New York Christian Work. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
THREE IMPORTANT BOOKS. 
 
 Recollections of the Civil War. 
 
 By Charles A. Dana. With Portrait and Index. Large 
 i2mo. Gilt top, uncut, $2.00. 
 
 "The book will rank among the trustworthy sources of knowledge of the 
 civil war." — Ne-w York Evening Post. 
 
 "Mr. Dana's official position as Assistant Secretary of War while the re- 
 bellion was in progress gave him exceptional opportunities of observation which 
 he was keen to take advantage of, while his rare gift of terse and vivid expres- 
 sion enabled him to record what he saw in a series of pen pictures that are little 
 less than instantaneous photographs. The feature par excellence of these 
 reminiscences is their interesting character. . . . He tells you briefly but 
 graphically what he saw, heard, or did himself. One gains a very real and 
 personal knowledge of the war from these 'Recollections.' " — Chicago Times- 
 Herald. 
 
 Cannon and Camera. 
 
 Sea and Land Battles of the Spanish-American War in 
 Cuba, Camp Life, and the Return of the Soldiers. De- 
 scribed and illustrated by J. C. Hemment, War Artist at 
 the Front. With over one hundred full-page pictures 
 taken by the Author, and an Index. Large i2ino. Cloth, 
 $2.00. 
 
 " Accurate as well as picturesque. . . . Mr. Hemment has done his work 
 well. In point of faithful realism there has thus far been nothing better in the 
 whole war literature." — Boston Journal. 
 
 Puerto Rico and its Resources. 
 
 A book for Travelers, Investors, and others, containing 
 Full Accounts of Natural Features and Resources, Prod- 
 ucts, People, Opportunities for Business, etc. By Fred- 
 erick A. Oeer, author of "Camps in the Caribbees," 
 " Crusoe's Island," etc. With Map and Illustrations. 
 i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 "You have brought together in a small space an immense amount of most 
 valuable information, which it is very important to have within the reach of the 
 American people at this time." — Hon. Henry Cabot Lodge. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
A PICTURESQUE BOOK OF THE SEA. 
 A Sailor's Log. 
 
 Recollections of Forty Tears of Naval Life. By Rear- 
 Admiral Robley D. Evans, U. S. N. Illustrated. 
 Large i2mo. Cloth, $2.00. 
 
 "It is essentially a book for men, young and old ; and the 
 man who does not enjoy it is lacking in healthy red blood." — 
 Chicago Bookseller. 
 
 "A profoundly interesting book. There is not a line of bra- 
 vado in its chapters, nor a carping criticism. It is a book which 
 will increase the esteem and high honor which the American feels 
 and willingly awards our naval heroes." — Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 "It would be difficult to find an autobiography possessing 
 more interest than this narrative of forty years of active naval serv- 
 ice. It equals the most fascinating novel for interest ; it contains 
 a great deal of material that has a distinct historical value. . . . 
 Altogether it is a most delightful book." — Brooklyn Eagle. 
 
 " His is a picturesque personality, and he stands the supreme 
 test by being as popular with his officers and men as he is with 
 the public generally. His life has been one of action and adven- 
 ture since he was a boy, and the record of it which he has pre- 
 pared in his book 'A Sailor's Log' has not a dull line in it from 
 cover to cover. It is all action, action, and. again action from the 
 first page to the last, and makes one want to go and ' do things ' 
 himself. Any boy between fitteen and nineteen who reads this 
 book and does not want to go to sea must be a sluggish youth. 
 . . . The book is really an interesting record of an interesting 
 man." — New York Press. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK.. 
 
A REMARKABLE AND TIMELY BOOK. 
 
 The Private Life of the Sultan. 
 
 By Georges Dorys, son of the late Prince of Samos, 
 a former minister of the Sultan, and formerly Governor 
 of Crete. Translated by Arthur Hornblow. Uniform 
 with "The Private Life of King Edward VII." Illus- 
 trated. i2mo. Cloth, $1.20 net; postage, 10 cents addi- 
 tional. 
 
 The high position that the writer's father held at Constantinople gave the 
 son a close insight into the personality of one of the least known of modem 
 rulers, so far as personality is concerned. It is unnecessary to say that the 
 author has long since left the domain of the Sultan of Turkey, and he is 
 now a member of the Young Turk party and a resident of Paris. It is now 
 announced that he has been recently condemned to death by the Sultan on 
 account of this book. He was formerly a correspondent of the London 
 Chronicle and sub-correspondent of the London Times at Constantinople. 
 That the influence of Abdul-Hamid extends beyond his own kingdom is 
 shown, however, by the fact that this book was recently suppressed in 
 Copenhagen. The power and persistence of Turkey, and the importance 
 of the Sultan in European politics as shown by the German Emperor's 
 efforts at affiliation, add weight to this curious story of the Sultan's rise to 
 power, his strange daily life and personal habits. The various details prac- 
 tically unknown to the world are of special interest as illustrations of the 
 actual character of a man with vast power and capable of causing the most 
 serious complications in world politics. This intimate history will help the 
 reader to balance the conflicting opinions that have been expressed of the 
 Sultan, ranging from Gladstone's phrase " The Great Assassin " to the com- 
 paratively rose-colored views of him as an amiable ruler, much harassed by 
 rebellious Armenians and unreasonably persistent creditors. The prospect 
 of the changes likely to be evolved by the Eastern question before much time 
 passes enhances the value of this book. The illustrations, which are numer- 
 ous and interesting, include an actual sketch of the Sultan that will be 
 found strangely at variance with the much earlier retouched portraits that 
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