Page:CooperBull1(1).djvu/4

 able minds whose after acts became a large portion of the history of our country, and of science. What a galaxy of bright names have been clustered around this survey. These were the men with whom our friend lived, thought and acted.

To the Eastern division Dr. Suckley was assigned, while Dr. Cooper was assigned to the Western under the direct superintendence of Brevet Captain Geo. B. McClellan of the Engineer Corps, to whom he reported June 14, 1853.

At this point we must digress to note the names here associated, which in a few years were to stand as the supporters of principles whose final disposition was made the basis of our Civil War. Jefferson C. Davis wrote and issued Dr. Cooper's instructions; Geo. B. McClellan was his immediate commander; U. S. Grant was the Regimental Quartermaster that issued his supplies; A. J. Donelson was in command of the escort and Hardie in command of the Division of the Pacific. As we read the orders and documents signed by these men, what memories are awakened!

Connected with this survey was Mullen, who afterwards became the roadmaker. There were John Torrey, Asa Gray, F. V. Hayden, Gibbs, Meek, Baird, Le Conte, Lesqueraux, Warren, Suckley and others who were co-laborers with Dr. Cooper, and who have written their names on the scroll of the world of science. From June 14, 1853 to April 1, 1854, Dr. Cooper was engaged in making botanical and zoological collections and meteorological observations. This latter work was the peculiar duty that was always assigned to the surgeons of the army, but until this time it had not been productive of any tangible results, although Blodgett had attempted to formulate some of the laws regarding climatic conditions, and was busy in reducing the accumulated observations, and Redfield had propounded his theory of storms. While engaged in the study of the forest growth of the Northwest, Dr. Cooper's attention was directly called to the correspondence between the forest distribution and climatic influences, which largely determined the environment. The result of this study was communicated to the public through the Smithsonian Institute, and was the first systematic statement regarding the forest growth that was issued by the Government.

While Dr. Cooper can not be regarded as a professional meteorologist, yet the reductions of the observations of this survey are models, and these observations had a profound influence on his future work. The survey was disbanded April 1, 1854, and McClellan ordered our friend to report to Gov. Stevens at Fort Vancouver. His specimens were transmitted to Prof. Baird at Washington, to which place he soon went for the purpose of preparing his report. Returning to the coast he spent the entire year of 1855 in collecting specimens of natural history, and it was at this time that his attention was so strongly fixed upon that line of thought in which probably he is best known—that of Conchology. His report on the ornithology of the survey has become a model, and is marked by deep, searching and comprehensive observations. Dr. Suckley was a joint author with Cooper, and reported on a separate section.

Late in the fall of 1855 Dr. Cooper went up the coast to Gray's Harbor, joining the Indian Treaty Commission under Gov. Stevens, intending to accompany the Governor to the Blackfoot Council at Fort Benton, but in this he was disappointed. In the meantime he made a voyage to the Straits of Fuca and spent a month on Whitby's Island, collecting specimens, returning to Shoalwater Bay in July where he remained until Oct. 4, when he sailed in the Coast Survey steamer Active, by invitation of Capt. Allen, to San Francisco. He spent six weeks collecting specimens in the Santa Clara Valley, then proceeding southward to Panama he collected shells for his father, whose last scientific writing was a report on West Coast shells, Pacific R. R. Report. This large collection passed into the hands of the Chicago Academy of Sciences and was destroyed in the great fire. Dr. Suckley was not with him at this time, he having returned to the East. Altogether Dr. Cooper spent two years and three months in Washington Territory, and this was really his school of preparation. From April 1, 1854, until 1857, all of the work that he did was by his own private enterprise and in obedience to his love for science, and it is at this point that we bid farewell to the botanist and welcome the ornithologist and conchologist.

On April 22, 1857, Dr. Cooper was by the Secretary of the Interior, appointed Surgeon to the Wagon Road from Fort Kearney to the South Pass and Honey Lake. However, when the expedition reached the Rocky Mountains, it became necessary to disband it, and the Doctor went on a collecting trip through the Mojave desert. The results of this trip are contained in his various reports on the fauna of