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 o6 THE CONDOR [ Vol. IV A Letter from Dr. Coues to Dr. Cooper. HE following letter, contributed by Mr. Emerson, is of interest just now, in connection with the life of Dr. Cooper. We have here a glimpse into the past, showing us at once the friendship existing between Dr. Cooper and Dr. Coues, and the esteem in which Cassin was held by his fellow workers. Fort Macon, North Carolina. February 2t, 869. MY DEAR COO?Era I have not heard from you for so long, that I don't recollect which one of us owes the other a letter; but that's no great matter after all! I have received the two copies of your paper so kindly sent, and read them with unusual inter- est and profit. You quote me, I notice, very extensively. I have not the pa- pers by me or I should like to make a few notes that struck me on first peru- sal. I consider the paper a highly in- teresting and very valuable one. That one now printing in the "Naturalist" will also be of great practical service. Please let me have a copy of all that you write. I understand that your large work will be out before long. I think I have seen it announced, in print, in some publisher's prospectus. but can not recall definitely. Ilook for it with eager interest. I have sent you, I think, all the papers that I have published since my "Prodrome," directing them for want of more definite address to care of the S. F. Nat. Hist. Soc. Have you received them? A short one, "List of Birds Collected in Arizona by Dr. Ed. Palmer," bears directly upon your work. He got on the Gila desert 3 species not previously attributed to the Territory; and several kinds of eggs not before known to the ornithologists. My large work still remains in MSS; but is about ready for the press. I have about 250o pages of MSS. Yours and mine together will, [ think, about use up the subject. Yours has the great desideratum of mine--illustrations. I know these will be GREAT; .have seen the proofs of a great many of them, and they are first rate. Best things out since Cassin's and the Pac. R. R. Re- ports!! I deeply regret that my book can boast of nothing of the sort; but I have no means of procuring any such desirable embellishments. After my long stay at Columbia, over 2 years, I am at length moved. Fort' Macon is on one of the long islands off the coast of North Carolina just oppo- site Beaufort. I did comparatively lit- tle at Columbia in the bird line, my po- sition being a very onerous one as regarding official duties. I only man- aged to collect data for a Synopsis of the Birds of the State (a copy of which I sent you). Although the birds are of course well known in the general run, I thought that a new carefully pre- pared list might find an acceptable place in our chronicles. I have as much time here at my disposal as you seem to have at drum barracks, and I hope to put it to good account in the line of ornithological studies. l have never before lived on the South Atlantic sea- board. Of course you heard the sad, 'sad news that John Cassin's labors are end- ed. The loss to Science none of us can measure; nor can those privileged to call him friend adequately express the depth of that bereavement. And many as are our American ornithologists-- high as some stand in American orni- thology-there is none left in all our land who can lift up the mantle that has fallen from his shoulders. His good work is accomplished, and he has gone to reap the rich reward of a life nobly spent in the survey of Nature's beauties, in drinking from the peren- nial fountain of Nature's truths. Since Audubon passed away from the scene of his usefulness, death has struck no such cruel blow to our beloved science. As Dr. Brewer has said to me, "which one of our younger ornithologists will