REASONS FOR GENEALOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS.

[COMMUNICATED FOR THE REGISTER.]

Perhaps at no time since the settlement of our country, has the public mind been so deeply interested in genealogical research as it is at the present. There is now perceived among all classes, a growing disposition to make inquiries respecting the past. The National and State archives are compelled to surrender the treasures which for centuries have been locked up in their musty embrace. On every side individuals are to be found, who are ransacking the homesteads of their fathers, to acquire materials for biography and to settle the questions respecting their ancestors which inquisitiveness suggests.

Some of these individuals appear to be urged on by curiosity alone. If, through their inquiries, they ascertain that they have descended from an old and celebrated family, the discovered fact seems to repay them for all the toil at the expense of which that fact may be brought to light. To establish their claim to descent from some noted warrior of the age of chivalry, or from some distinguished statesman of a later date, they are willing, not only to spend laborious days and sleepless nights, but their purses are open, and their gratitude is freely expressed, to any one who shall furnish them with a link to perfect the chain which may connect them with their supposed an

cestors.

A family pride, either innate or acquired, leads other inquirers to their task. It is the height of their ambition to be able to trace their lineage to the first settlers of our country. To have derived their existence from the noble band who left a home rendered insupportable by religious persecution, and crossed the stormy Atlantic in the frail Mayflower, is to them a source of the highest pleasure. In their efforts to establish this derivation, facts of great importance in the local history of our country have been elicited. These efforts have given birth to most of our town histories, whereby materials, invalua ble to our future historiographers and biographers are preserved from the ravages of time. These men in consequence of their researches become the nuclei of associations for historical, genealogical, and biographical pursuits, which, here and there, are springing into existence. These associations are awakening the mass of the people to a sense of the importance of the objects for which they were formed. Many young men, naturally enthusiastic in every thing they undertake, have caught the spirit of antiquarian research. From them we have much to hope. New modes of investigation may be projected, new plans for arranging and preserving historical and genealogical discoveries may be proposed, and new deductions from these discoveries may be made. Such are some of the advantages which may be confidently predicted as the result of these labors in the genealogical field.

Other inquirers are inclined to the study of genealogy from the argumentum ad pecuniam. The vast amount of property which remains in abeyance in the old world, has arrested their attention. Every announcement of estates wanting heirs stimulates anew their investigations; and the presiding genius of the age suggests to them the possibility of finding themselves entitled to this unclaimed property. How important, then, that a genealogical record should exist, where