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114 In connection with the lectures he compiled a small elementary treatise. Dr. Hosaek commended him as being the first in the field with this course, saying: "You have adopted the true system of education, and very properly address yourself to the memory."

Finding that his taste for the incidents of legal practice was diminishing, and his interest in science was growing upon him, Mr. Eaton resolved to abandon the law and devote himself to the more congenial pursuit. He removed to New Haven in 1815, and there placed himself under the tuition of Prof. Silliman, who was lecturing on chemistry, geology, and mineralogy. He enjoyed the advantage of Prof. Silliman's library and of that of Prof. Ives, in which works on botany and materia medica were prominent, and was a diligent student of the college cabinet of minerals. He removed to Williams College, where he gave courses of lectures to volunteer classes of the students on botany, mineralogy, and geology, and awakened a permanent interest in the natural sciences. An interesting description of his personality at this time, when he was in his prime, is given by Prof. Albert Hopkins, who speaks of him as "of striking personage, a large form, somewhat portly and dignified, though entirely free from what is commonly called starch. His face was highly intellectual, the forehead high and somewhat retreating, locality strongly marked, and the organs of observation and compassion well developed. His hair was black, and, being combed back, rendered his fine physiognomy still more striking." In the same year the first edition was published of Prof. Eaton's Manual of Botany, a work the appearance of which, according to Dr. Lewis C. Beck, gave an impulse to the study of botany in New England and New York, which had been hampered by the want of a manual in English. The only descriptive work previous to this one was that of Pursch, in which the descriptions were in Latin. The Manual was added to and became fuller, in successive editions, till the eighth edition, published in 1840, was a large octavo volume of 625 pages, known as the North American Botany of Profs. Eaton and Wright, and contained descriptions of 5,267 species of plants.

From Williams College the lectures were extended, in the shape of courses, with practical instructions to classes, to the larger towns of New England and New York. Prof. Eaton was greatly aided in this enterprise by the patronage and encouragement he had received from the faculty and students of Williams College, and the fame he derived from his lectures there; and he made an acknowledgment of this fact in dedicating the second edition of his botany to the president and professors, when he said: "The science of botany is indebted to you for its first introduction into the interior of the Northern States, and I am indebted to you for a passport into the scientific world." In the course of two or