in the Confederation

[1783-1784]

FROM THE GERMAN OF

JOHANN DAVID SCHOEPF

=

TRANSLATED and Edited

BY

ALFRED J. MORRISON

NEW JERSEY, PENNSYLVANIA, MARYLAND, VIRGINIA

PHILADELPHIA

WILLIAM J. CAMPBELL

1911

ADVERTISEMENT

Dr. Schoepf, at the time of his travels in America, was in his thirty-second year. He was born March 8, 1752, at Wunsiedel, (birth-place of Jean Paul), in the principality of Bayreuth, a town of the Fichtelberg and a region of mines and quarries. His father was a merchant well-to-do, who had him educated by tutors at home, sent him to the Gymnasium at Hof, and, in 1770, to the University of Erlangen. Schoepf's studies there were primarily in medicine, but he followed lectures in the natural sciences generally; Schreber and Esper were his masters in botany and mineralogy. In 1773 he was at Berlin for work in forestry. Before taking his degree at Erlangen, in 1776, he travelled, investigating the mine country of Saxony, was in Bohemia, studied at Prague and Vienna, traversed Carniola, Northern Italy, and Switzerland. It was already plain that he would not spend his life as an obscure practicioner. During 1776, at Ansbach, he thought of going to India. The next year he was appointed chief surgeon to the Ansbach troops destined for America, and arrived at New York, June 4, 1777. After his return to Europe, in 1784, Dr. Schoepf was diligent in scientific research and held besides many positions of public trust, dying September 10, 1800, as President of the United Medical Colleges of Ansbach and Bayreuth.'

1 Hirsch, Biogr. Lexikon der hervorrag. Aerzte aller Zeiten und Völker. Fr. Ratzel, in Allgem. Deutsche Biographie. Edw. Kremers, Introd., Materia Medica Americana, Lloyd

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As much as any other man at that time Dr. Schoepf seems to have made North America his study. The following are his most important contributions touching this Continent: Ueber Klima, Witterung, Lebensart und Krankheiten in Nordamerika;' Von dem gegenwärtigen Zustand in Nordamerika aus dem Lande selbst, im Jahre 1783; Vom amerikanischen Frosche; Der gemeine Hecht in Amerika, and Der nordamerikanische Haase; Beschreibung einiger nordamerikanischen Fische, vorzüglich aus den newyorkischen Gewässern; Materia Medica Americana, potissimum Regni Vegetabilis;' Beyträge zur mineralogischen Kenntniss des östlichen Theils von Nord Amerika;'

Library Bulletin, Cincinnati, 1903. Rosengarten, The German Soldier in the Wars of the United States. Philadelphia, 1890. Pp. 91-98.

2

In Meusel's Hist. Literatur, 1781; appearing also, modified, as a prefix, Reise II. Translation of the original pamphlet by Dr. J. R. Chadwick, Boston, Houghton, 1875, 8vo. pp. 31

3

3 In Schloezer's Staats-Anzeigen, VII, 1785. Four articles. *In Naturforscher, No. 18.

"In Schrift. der Berliner Gesellschaft Naturforschender Freunde, No. 3 (1788), p. 138 ff.-" The first special ichthyological paper ever written in America or concerning American species." Goode, Beginnings of Natural History in America, Smithsonian Institution Report, 1897, II, 396 (Nat. Museum).

'Erlangen, 1787; Lloyd Library Reproduction Series, Cincinnati, 1903. The first treatise in that department, and the authority well into the nineteenth century.

* Erlangen, 1787-" Commonly regarded as the first work on American geology." Merrill, Contributions to the History of American Geology, Smithsonian Institution Report, 1904 (Nat. Museum), p. 208.