Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 33.djvu/571

Rh of the society, and his reluctance to making any formal address. This modesty—indeed, timidity—in an eminent writer and thinker whose lightest words were sure of eager attention in a society composed mainly of his personal friends and wholly of his admirers, was the more remarkable because his address, presented a few minutes later, was most pleasing in its delivery as well as instructive in its substance.

About a year before his death, Prof. Baird was informed by his medical adviser that complete rest from mental exertion was necessary to the restoration of his nervous energies. He accordingly obtained the appointment of two assistants to relieve him of the burden of his cares, and sought the recuperation which he needed. In the summer of 1887 he returned to his work by the sea-side, to Wood's Holl, where he had created the greatest biological laboratory in the world; and in that laboratory, says Major Powell, "with the best results of his life-work all about him, he calmly and philosophically waited for the time of times. Thursday, before he died, he asked to be placed in a chair provided with wheels. On this he was moved around the pier, past the vessels which he had built for the research, and through the laboratory, where many men were at work at their biologic investigations. For every one he had a word of good cheer, though he knew it was his last. At the same time, along the pier and through the laboratory, a little child was wheeled. 'We are rivals,' he said, 'but I think that I am the bigger baby.'" Then he was carried to his chamber, where he soon became insensible.

Of the honors given to Prof. Baird, besides the usual supplementary college degrees conferred by Dickinson College and Columbian University, he was awarded the silver medal of the Acclimatization Society of Melbourne, the gold medal of the Société d'Acclimatation of France, the first honor-prize (the gift of the Emperor of Germany) of the Internationale Fischerei Ausstellung at Berlin, and the decoration of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olaf. He was a member of the council of the National Academy of Sciences, was permanent secretary of the American Association in 1850 and 1851, was trustee of the Corcoran Art Gallery, president of the Cosmos Club, a trustee of Columbian University, and a member of the Historical Society of New York. Among foreign societies in which he held honorary or other memberships, were the Linnæan and Zoölogical Societies of London, the Linnæan Society of New South Wales, the New Zealand Institute, the Geographical Society of Quebec, and Royal or other scientific societies in Vienna, Lisbon, Batavia, Buda-Pesth, Cherbourg, Jena, Halle, Nuremberg, and Berlin. More than twenty-five species and one genus in zoölogy, and a post-office in Shasta County, Cal., bear his name.