languages, and the place of chief librarian, at Cornell university. To his unremitting labors for years in the class-room, as librarian, and as director of the University press, no inconsiderable degree of the success of the institution is due. During this time he took a deep interest in the reform of the civil service, and was a most influential writer and lecturer in its behalf. In 1879 he was again abroad for five months, and visited Iceland. He had been a principal promoter in this country of the contribution of a library on the celebration of the National millennium, and upon his arrival he was the guest of the nation and accorded honors seldom if ever given before by one nation to a private citizen of another. His health failing from his severe application to college duties, he went abroad again in 1880. In that year, in Berlin, he married Miss Jennie McGraw, of Ithaca, N. Y., who died in September, 1881. In 1881 he resigned his offices at Cornell and took up his permanent residence in Florence, Italy. Although his chief work has been that of a scholar and bibliopole, he has been a voluminous contributor to various Swedish, Icelandic, and German journals, and to the American press. He was one of the famous chess tournament of 1857, and, in conjunction with Paul Morphy, edited the “American Chess Monthly” in 1857-'60, and compiled the “Book of the American Chess Congress” (New York, 1859). He has edited various university publications, such as the “Ten-Year Book of Cornell,” the “Register,” etc., and many bibliographical publications, such as the “University Library Bulletin,” the “Bibliographia Psiupsilonica,” etc. He was one of the chief promoters of the chapter-house system in the Greek letters societies. He is now engaged in completing his two private book collections, one relating to Petrarch, the other to Icelandic history and literature—the most considerable collections in existence relating to those subjects—and is printing privately a series of “Bibliographical Notices” illustrating his collections. Prof. Fiske has received the degree of A. M. from Hamilton and that of Ph. D. from Cornell.
FISKE, John, naval officer, b. in Salem, Mass.,
10 April, 1744; d. there, 28 Sept., 1797. He was a
son of the Rev. Samuel Fiske, of the first church,
Salem. In 1775 he was a master mariner, and
became captain of the “Tyrannicide,” the first
war-vessel commissioned by the state of Massachusetts,
8 July, 1776. He made many successful cruises in
her, and was engaged in several sanguinary
combats. On 10 Dec, 1777, he took command of the
state ship “Massachusetts,” a larger and a better
vessel. After the war he engaged in commerce,
and became wealthy. He was commissioned major-general
of militia in 1792.
FISKE, John, author, b. in Hartford, Conn.,
30 March, 1842. He is the only child of Edmund
Brewster Green, of Smyrna, Del., and Mary Fiske
Bound, of Middletown, Conn. The father was
editor of newspapers in Hartford, New York, and
Panama, where he died in 1852, and his widow
married Edwin W. Stoughton, of New York, in
1855. The son's name was originally Edmund
Fiske Green; in 1855 he took the name of his
maternal great-grandfather, John Fiske. He lived at
Middletown during childhood and until he
entered Harvard, where he was graduated in 1863.
He was graduated at the Harvard law-school in
1865, having been already admitted to the Suffolk
bar in 1864, but has never practised law. His
career as author began in 1861, with an article on
“Mr. Buckle's Fallacies,” published in the
“National Quarterly Review.” Since that time he has
been a frequent contributor to American and
British periodicals. In 1869-'71 he was university
lecturer on philosophy at Harvard, in 1870
instructor in history there, and in 1872-'9 assistant
librarian. On resigning the latter place in 1879
he was elected a member of the board of overseers,
and at the expiration of the six-years' term was
re-elected in 1885. Since 1881 he has lectured
annually on American history at Washington university,
St. Louis, Mo., and since 1884 has held a
professorship of American history at that institution,
but continues to make his home in Cambridge.
He lectured on American history at University
college, London, in 1879, and at the Royal institution
of Great Britain in 1880. Since 1871 he has
given many hundred lectures, chiefly upon American
history, in the principal cities of the United
States and Great Britain. The largest part of his
life has been devoted to the study of history; but
at an early age inquiries into the nature of human
progress led him to a careful study of the doctrine
of evolution, and it was as an expounder of this
doctrine that he first became known to the public.
In 1871 he arrived at the discovery of the causes
of the prolonged infancy of mankind, and the part
played by it in determining human development;
and the importance of this contribution to the
Darwinian theory, now generally admitted, was
immediately recognized by Darwin and Spencer.
His published books are: “Tobacco and Alcohol”
(New York, 1868); “Myths and Myth-Makers”
(Boston, 1872); “Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy,
based on the Doctrine of Evolution” (2 vols., London,
1874; republished in Boston); “The Unseen
World” (Boston, 1876); “Darwinism, and Other
Essays” (London, 1879; new and enlarged edition,
Boston, 1885); “Excursions of an Evolutionist”
(Boston, 1883); “The Destiny of Man viewed in
the Light of his Origin” (Boston, 1884); “The
Idea of God as affected by Modern Knowledge”
(Boston, 1885); “American Political Ideas viewed
from the Standpoint of Universal History” (New
York, 1885); and “The Critical Period of American
History” (Boston, 1888).
FISKE, Nathan, clergyman. b. in Weston, Mass., 9 Sept., 1733; d. in Brookfield, Mass., 24 Nov., 1799. He was graduated at Harvard in 1754, studied theology, was licensed to preach in the Congregational denomination, and began his ministry in Brookfield, Mass., in May, 1758. He organized a society for mutual advancement and intellectual culture, which published its productions, and continued the publication of essays and addresses the rest of his life. With little interruption they appeared in the Worcester "Gazette," the "Massachusetts Magazine," and the "Spy." His ministerial work was continued without interruption, and he delivered a sermon on the day of his death. He received the degree of D. D. from Harvard in 1792. Dr. Fiske's published works include "An Historical Sermon on the Settlement and Growth of Brookfield" (1775); "Oration on the Capture of Lord Cornwallis " (1781) ; a volume of sermons (1794); "Dudleian Lecture at Harvard" (1796) ; and a volume of essays entitled "The Moral Monitor," published after his death (2 vols., 1801). The last-named work was used extensively as a school-reader.— His son, Nathan Welby, clergyman, b. in Weston, Mass., 17 April, 1798 ; d. in Jerusalem, Palestine, 27 May, 1847. He was graduated at Dartmouth in 1817, and had charge of an academy in Newcastle, Me., for a year. He was chosen tutor at Dartmouth in 1818, which post he held two years, and was graduated at Andover theological seminary in 1828. In November of that
