WELDING FELL DENNIS, the son of Jacob J. Dennis and of Abi Kirk Fell, was born in Wilkesbarre, on the 1st day of October, 1818. He drew his first breath in a room in his father's home, an isolated mansion in a scantily inhabited village. His last expiring breath was given out, a few nights since, in the same room of the same house, now one of a number of closely congregated dwellings in the busiest street of the populous city of Wilkesbarre. A grandson of the well-known Judge, Jesse Fell, many of whose genial and admirable traits of character he seemed to inherit, and connected with some of the best known families of the olden times in the history of a town always remarkable for its conservatism and adherence to traditions, many of his traits of character and habits of thought may be traced to the strong impressions of early influences upon him.

He received his school education in the Academy of his native place, and, while a pupil in this, was a beloved and popular companion among his fellows, noted for his sprightliness, activity, and feats of strength, and remarkable for the intellectual readiness which enabled him to grasp the full scope of any subject of his studies, or to solve a problem without apparent effort, while some of his more pains-taking fellow-students would, only after hours of labor, arrive at the result which his quicker mind had instinctively grasped.

As a boy, he was interested in observing the characteristics and modes of life of animals, the flights of birds, their habits, and those of the insect-tribes. He loved nature, and soon learned without preceptor, to explore her ways. He was in sympathy with the woods and fields. He noted the changes made by the ever-recurrent seasons, and with scant instruction and little access to books, early became familiar with the fauna and flora of this region. Fond of animals, devoted to those of them whom he had adopted as pets, by his skill in the treatment of their diseases and injuries, as well as by his ability in ministering to hurts received in fight, or in play, by his village comrades, he obtained, by common consent, from the latter, the title of doctor, long before he showed a leaning to the profession which he afterwards embraced and graced.

He received his collegiate education at Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pa., and upon his return from college, entered as a pupil, the office of the late Dr. Thos. W. Miner, occupying with his studies the prescribed three years. Taking one course of lectures at the University of Pennsylvania, and two at the Jefferson Medical College, he received his diploma from the latter institution in the spring of

1842.

He commenced the practice of his profession in his native place, and there continued it with a better success than rewards the endeavors of most tyros, until the year 1850, when, at the instance of the officers of the Pennsylvania Coal Company, he removed to the neighboring town of Pittston. While practising with zeal and success in Pittston, and skilfully combating there a severe malarious epidemic, he formed an engagement which resulted in his happy marriage in June, 1851, at Johnstown, N. Y., to Catherine Frothingham, a grand-niece of Washington Irving, who, with a

daughter and grandchild, are the survivors of his immediate family.

Soon after this event, he returned to Wilkesbarre, in which city he continued to live until his death, and to practise his profession with success and honor, until within a few months of the sad and fatal issue of the disease which had long been invading his system. During the last two years his health had been gradually failing, but with the hopefulness that belonged to his character, and which is so commonly attendant upon the malady which was sapping the foundations of his life, he would not yield to the remonstrances of his family and medical friends, place himself under treatment, or indulge in more than one single brief absence from his home and daily duties. About the middle of March of this year, his strength suddenly failed, and after that time he never left his house. His disease was phthisis, attacking mainly the larynx, and finally invading the apices of the lungs with miliary deposits. During its latter stage, he emaciated. rapidly, lost strength, and finally sank without having experienced much suffering or any pain. He ended his last illness with perfect fortitude and calmness, and at the end, without a struggle, resigned to his fate, aware of its certainty, at peace with all the world; he quietly passed into his rest in the early morning of May 1st, 1876. Dr. Dennis was a firm believer in the cardinal doctrines of the Christian religion, and had no difficulty in reconciling these with the prevailing theories of "evolution" and "natural selection of species," which he, in common with most men of scientific habits of thought and culture, have accepted. He was a member of St. Stephen's Episcopal Church of this city. During his last illness he was sustained in a marked degree by this faith. He died in it, comforted by the conviction that his Redeemer had died for him, and that he himself was one of the inheritors of the promise of everlasting life.

Having thus given to you briefly the main facts of the life and death of our deceased friend and comrade, I will endeavor to present to you, as succinctly as possible, what I conceive to be the salient points of his character and history: first, the personal ones; secondly, those relating to his professional career.

1st. Dr. Dennis had by nature a strongly marked, bold, original, positive, and incisive mind. No one who knew him, early or late in his life, was ever left by him in doubt as to what his sentiments or opinions were upon any subject. He may have been often accused of having too strong convictions, founded upon prejudice, but not suspicion of his ever having favored, flattered, cringed, or bowed the knee to any human voice, power, or opinion, entered the mind of those who knew him. His force of character so remained through his life, but with increasing years there were added to these qualities of firmness, whether from his profound religious convictions, or knowledge and admission of his own and his fellows' infirmities, an amount of gentle consideration for others, charity and grace, which served to amend and modify these points of his character, which otherwise might have too sharply protruded.

Though thus bold and frank in the expression of his opinions, he was yet always urbane and courteous. He possessed, in an eminent

degree, the social qualities. Fond of congenial companionship, full of anecdote, apt in illustration, with a memory stored with the traditions of the good old times of his youth, and with the histories of the original and eccentric characters who flourished in the earlier days of the valley of Wyoming, he was a delightful companion and welcome guest wherever he went.

He possessed a wonderful memory. Every instance, fact, event, date that he had noticed, heard of, or acquired a knowledge of in his general and desultory reading, at once fastened itself in some cell of his mental structure, and was ever afterwards ready to be found and reproduced, intact and unaltered. History, ancient and modern, biography, general literature, art, poetry, natural history, all contributed their bountiful quota to this store-house of his, and drafts at sight upon any of these subjects were honored by his memory, as soon as presented. He was well versed in geology, mineralogy, ornithology, and botany, and if his modesty and indisposition to appear in print had not prevented, he would long since have been recognized as an important contributor to the knowledge had of many curious and interesting peculiarities of the rocks of the coal fields of this valley.

His early interest in the natural sciences continued throughout his life. His knowledge of these, increasing with years, made him an authority upon these subjects. As stated in the obituary notice of him by the Hon. E. L. Dana, at the recent meeting of the Wyoming Historical and Geological Society, Dr. Dennis was one of the founders, and of the most active and efficient members of this scientific association. By his interest in its proceedings, care of and additions to its cabinet, and enthusiasm in behalf of its work, he contributed largely to its success and permanence.

He was less a student than an observer and thinker. He had the faculty of rapidly gleaning the important contents of any volume, and of soon absorbing a summary of its meaning. His intuitions guided him more than did connected processes of reasoning, or of deductions from data and statistics. He was a man of perfect truth and integrity. He was modest and without pretension. Proud he was, with the pride of one who scorns a base act, but not with the imitation of that quality which loves glitter and display. Sensitive in the extreme, he was chilled and wounded by even the apparent acts of estrangement or neglect of his friends or patients. In his domestic, as in his other social relations, he was gentle and tender. He loved children, and his sympathies went out, especially to the little sufferers whose wants he was called upon to minister to.

2d. His professional life was not illustrated by any published display of the rich gifts and acquirements of his mind. With a perhaps morbid diffidence, he carefully avoided any act which could cause his name or manuscript to appear in print. He was capable of literary composition, terse, well worded and expressed, but he rarely or never acceded to the wishes of his friends in this direction.

He was one of the founders of our Society, which now commemorates his connection with it and deplores the loss its members have met with, by his removal from among our number. During many

years he was often with us, and took an active part and interest in our proceedings.

Dr. Dennis, during his medical life, enjoyed a large practice and the confidence and love of his numerous patients, as well as of those of his brethren who knew him well, or of others who applied to him for aid and advice in consultation. As a surgeon, he was eminently successful, and in the earlier periods of his career, when he was the only practitioner in this vicinity who was advanced to the extent of the professional standard of the times, he, unaided, performed many exploits in surgery, which were then considered brilliant.

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He possessed great mechanical ingenuity and manipulative skill. In an emergency, with the aid of a blacksmith, or carpenter, or often with only his own tools and lathe, he could prepare portions of a surgical armament suitable for any desired purpose. Upon one occasion, when in need of an obstetric forceps he had one forged in a few minutes, which perfectly met his wants. another, at a time when communications with the great cities were few and far between, he prepared, with the aid of a gunsmith, a set of cataract needles and an eye-speculum, for an operation for cataract, which was urgent. These were employed by him, found to be efficient, and superior to those which had been ordered from the city and delayed in their coming.

In adjusting fractured limbs, reducing dislocations, in making applications for injuries or distortions, he was never at a loss, and frequently, with the most homely and simple materials, contrived an apparatus, which attained the result foreshadowed by his judg ment and eye, as well as would have done the most costly appliances of the shops.

His skill in the diagnosis of disease was very great, and often seemed to be intuitive and not dependent upon any process of induction. His conclusions as to the causes and progress of morbid phenomena were usually correct, and such as would lead to the adoption of the proper and successful treatment of them.

If, in his opinion upon professional matters, he was not exactly "addictus jurare in Verba Magistri," he was yet, as in other respects, tenacious of old traditions, customs, and modes of practice. His enthusiasm did not run in the direction of new remedies or methods, yet while very slow and cautious in accepting and adopting novelties, he would courteously listen to the argument of his confréres in the behalf of these, and yield himself to their views, only upon conviction, after repeated experiment on the part of others, and then sometimes with a half expressed protest.

In consultation with his professional brethren, he was always affable and courteous, treating their views and suggestions with due consideration, but firm in holding to his own opinions, surrendering these only in deference to the most conclusive arguments.

He was a determined and conscientious adherent to the rules of common sense, common courtesy, and decency, applying to professional intercourse, which, among the public who are not familiar with them and with our good reasons for the enaction of them, are sometimes sharply criticized as a system of formal and needless medical etiquette. He was a model of erectness in these matters

and an exemplar to his fellows. In no case would he prescribe for a patient, without the knowledge of, or the proper dismissal of the previous attendant. He would neither exact nor receive a fee from a patient whom he was attending in courtesy to an absent or an ailing professional brother, or continue his attendance after the ability of said friend to return to duty. During, or after consultation with his brethren, he was most careful to refrain from statement or act that would compromise them in the opinion or respect of the patient. Nor did he ever by a shrug, a lifting of the brow, a hint that he could, and if he would," convey the implication, that he had been called in time to save the patient's life, or that his method was superior to his predecessor's.

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For the "fellows of the baser sort," who make a trade of the profession of medicine, to win short-lived fame among the vulgar, or attain mere mercenary ends, he had in an extreme degree that contempt which such intruders merit. That he never forgave a breach of etiquette, or of what he considered fair dealing and upright conduct on the part of a fellow practitioner, I would scarcely admit. But he was in the habit of showing great reserve and distance to those nominal members of the profession whom he deemed to have forfeited by unprofessional acts, their claims to kinship with the purer ones.

He may have sometimes erred in this respect. His standard of professional honor was high. Sensitive in the extreme to the existence of a blot upon the good name of the calling which he looked upon as the highest earthly one, it is probable that he was occasionally too suspicious of others who were striving for prominence, or pecuniary support, and that he may have been disposed to exaggerate the gravity of their offences against a very stringent code.

His patients were devoted to him and rarely went out from under his care. They generally depended upon his sound judgment and skill, and faithfully obeyed his instructions. If they failed in this respect, he seldom left in uncertainty, his displeasure at any breach on their part of the implied contract between the doctor and the doctored. He looked upon himself as the dictator in the sick room, and did not receive as favorably as do some of his weaker brethren, the suggestions of friends as to infallible remedies, which in this sort of informal consultation, are so often thrust upon both sufferer and the attendant. Those who made these suggestions to him, rarely repeated them.

Dr. Dennis's manner to his patients was simple and direct, but courteous. He made use of none of the arts so often employed to win favor, and did not indulge in the very suave and politic forms of address which have been characterized as "the medical mannerism."

He was as far as possible from being mercenary. Very many of his visits were gratuitous, and he, more often than was just to himself, failed to exact the proper dues to that "laborer," of all others, who is worthy of his hire."

Thus briefly, gentlemen of the society, but, as the subject has grown under my hands, less briefly than I first intended, have I given you such an epitome as I could of the life and character of one whom I loved, your and my brother, who "has gone before."