city, that by a series of observations made every three hours, during the month of August, he had ascertained that there was a slight lunar tide in Lake Michigan. A similar statement was made to the Smithsonian Institution, in connection with the report of his meteorological observations for the month. In a report made to the British Association in 1863, he stated that the amount of this tide was about an inch and an eighth, and that subsequently a self-registering tide-gauge, similar to that used by Prof essor A. D. Bache on the Coast Survey, was put in operation at the port, the indications of which, deducing the curves from 5,450 half-hourly ordinates, between July, 1859, and November, 1860, gave results almost exactly corresponding with those of his original observation.
Mr. Lapham was engaged, almost from the beginning of his residence in Wisconsin, in the study of the aboriginal earth-works of the State. He was the first to notice that many of the mounds were really gigantic figures of men, beasts, birds, and reptiles; and as early as 1836 he gave accounts in the newspapers of a turtle-shaped mound at Waukesha and of several other effigies of animals. Perceiving the danger of these structures being obliterated, he, availing himself of assistance offered by the American Antiquarian Society, made a systematic survey of many of them, the results of which were published in 1855, under the title of "Antiquities of Wisconsin," in a fine, richly illustrated volume by the Smithsonian Institution. Twenty years later, near the end of his life, he prepared a series of bas-relief models of some of the more characteristic mounds, for the Centennial Exhibition of 1876.
In 1868 fragments of a meteorite, afterward known as the "Doerflinger meteorite," were found on a farm about thirty miles northwest of Milwaukee. A specimen of the stone was obtained for the Wisconsin Natural History Society, of which that body, in consideration of the services he had performed for it, gave a piece to Dr. Lapham. Examining his piece, which had been polished and etched by Dr. J. Lawrence Smith, of Louisville, Kentucky, he discovered in it the familiar crystalline markings known as the Widmannstattian figures, and within these another set of lines, to which Dr. Smith, on their being brought to his notice, gave the name of the Laphamite Markings. A representation of this stone, showing both sets of marks, is given in the new "American Cyclopædia," article "Aëerolites." In connection with these observations, Dr. Lapham prepared a complete list of North American meteorites, with a map showing the exact place where every one fell, which, however, has not been published.
Dr. Lapham was one of the first men in the United States, if not the first, to move effectively in favor of general systematic weather observations for the purpose of forecasting and preparing for coming storms. Espy had shown that such a thing was possible; Professor Henry had
