™ . The Caliornia Institute AGASSIZ AT THE AGE OF "NINETEEN LOUIS AGA HIS LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE jo 3ji n 3H1 EDITED BY ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I. BOSTON HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street 1886 Copyright, 1885, Bl ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ. All rights reserved* FOURTH EDITION. The Riverside Press, Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0- Houghton & Co. . QH 3\ AZ AZ PREFACE. I AM aware that this book has neither the fullness of personal narrative, nor the closeness of scientific analysis, which its too comprehen- sive title might lead the reader to expect. A word of explanation is therefore needed. I thought little at first of the general public, when I began to weave together in narrative form the facts, letters, and journals contained in these volumes. My chief object was to pre- vent the dispersion and final loss of scattered papers which had an unquestionable family value. But, as my work grew upon my hands, I began to feel that the story of an in- tellectual life, which was marked by such rare coherence and unity of aim, might have a wider interest and usefulness ; might, perhaps, M. \ iv PREFACE. serve as a stimulus and an encouragement to others. For this reason, and also because I am inclined to believe that the European portion of the life of Louis Agassiz is little known in his adopted country, while its Amer- ican period must be unfamiliar to many in his native land, I have determined to publish the material here collected. The book labors under the disadvantage of being in great part a translation. The cor- respondence for the first volume was almost wholly in French and German, so that the choice lay between a patch-work of several languages or the unity of one, burdened as it must be with the change of version. I have accepted what seemed to me the least of these difficulties. Besides the assistance of my immediate fami- ly, including the revision of the text by my son Alexander Agassiz, I have been indebted to my friends Dr. and Mrs. Hagen and to the late Professor Guyot for advice on special points. PREFACE. V As will be seen from the list of illustrations, I have also to thank Mrs. John W. Elliot for her valuable aid in that part of the work. On the other side of the water I have had most faithful and efficient collaborators. Mr. Auguste Agassiz, who survived his brother Louis several years, and took the greatest in- terest in preserving whatever concerned his scientific career, confided to my hands many papers and documents belonging to his broth- er's earlier life. After the death of my brother-in-law, his cousin Mr. Auguste Mayor, of Neuchatel, continued the same affectionate service. Without their aid I could not have completed the narrative as it now stands. The friend last named also selected from the glacier of the Aar, at the request of Alex- ander Agassiz, the boulder which now marks his father's grave. With unwearied patience Mr. Mayor passed hours of toilsome search among the blocks of the moraine near the site of the old " HStel des Neuchatelois," and vi PREFACE. chose at last a stone so monumental in form that not a touch of the hammer was needed to fit it for its purpose. In conclusion I allow myself the pleasure of recording here my grat- itude to him and to all who have aided me in my work. ELIZABETH C. AGASSIZ. CAMBRIDGE, MASS., June 11, 1885. CONTENTS OF VOL. I. CHAPTER I. 1807-1827: TO ^T. 20. Birthplace. — Influence of his Mother. — Early Love of Natural History. — Boyish Occupations. — Do- mestic Education. — First School. — Vacations. — Commercial Life renounced. — College of Lausanne. — Choice of Profession. — Medical School of Zurich. — Life and Studies there. — University of Heidel- berg. — Studies interrupted by Illness. — Return to Switzerland. — Occupations during Convalescence . 1 CHAPTER II. 1827-1828: JST. 20-21. Arrival in Munich. — Lectures. — Relations with the Professors. — Schelling, Martius, Oken, Dollinger. — Relations with Fellow - Students. — The Little Academy. — Plans for Traveling. — Advice from his Parents. — Vacation Journey. — Tri-Centennial Diirer Festival at Nuremberg ..... 46 CHAPTER III. 1828-1829: JET. 21-22. First Important Work in Natural History. — Spix's Brazilian Fishes. — Second Vacation Trip. — Sketch viii CONTENTS OF VOL. I. of Work during University Year. — Extracts from the Journal of Mr. Dinkel. — Home Letters. — Hope of joining Huniboldt's Asiatic Expedition. — Diploma of Philosophy. — Completion of First Part of the Spix Fishes. — Letter concerning it from Cuvier . 74 CHAPTER IV. 1829-1830: JET. 22-23. Scientific Meeting at Heidelberg. — Visit at Home. — Illness and Death of his Grandfather. — Return to Munich. — Plans for Future Scientific Publications. — Takes his Degree of Medicine. — Visit to Vienna. — Return to Munich. — Home Letters. — Last Days at Munich. — Autobiographical Review of School and University Life 117 CHAPTER V. 1830-1832 : ,ET. 23-25. Year at Home. — Leaves Home for Paris. — Delays on the Road. — Cholera. — Arrival in Paris. — First Visit to Cuvier. — Cuvier's Kindness. — His Death. — Poverty in Paris. — Home Letters concerning Embarrassments and about his Work. — Singular Dream .....•••• 158 CHAPTER VI. 1832 : ^T. 25. Unexpected Relief from Difficulties. — Correspondence with Humboldt. — Excursion to the Coast of Nor- mandy. — First Sight of the Sea. — Correspondence concerning Professorship at Neuchatel. — Birthday Fete. — Invitation to Chair of Natural History at Neuchfttel. — Acceptance. — Letter to Humboldt . 184 CONTENTS OF VOL. L ix CHAPTER VII. 1832-1834: ^T. 25-27. Enters upon his Professorship at Neuchatel. — First Lecture. — Success as a Teacher. — Love of Teach- ing. — Influence upon the Scientific Life of Neucha- tel. — Proposal from University of Heidelberg. — Proposal declined. — Threatened Blindness. — Cor- respondence with Humboldt. — Marriage. — Invita- tion from Charpentier. — Invitation to visit England. — Wollaston Prize. — First Number of " Poissons Fossiles." — Review of the Work .... 206 CHAPTER VIII. 1834-1837: ^T. 27 -3 . . . From Boston, March 6th, I had the honor to thank you for your letter of January 5th, and for your splendid present of your great work on fossil fishes — livraison 1-22 — received, with the plates. I also gave a notice of the work in the April number of the Journal l (this present month), and repub- lished Mr. Bakewell's account of your visit to Mr. Mantell's museum. In Boston I made some little efforts in be- half of your work, and have the pleasure of naming as follows : — Harvard University, Cambridge (Cambridge is only four miles from Boston), by Hon. Josiah Quincy, President. Boston Athena3um, by its Librarian. Benjamin Green, Esq., President of the Bos- ton Natural History Society. I shall make application to some other insti- 1 The American Journal of Science and Arts. FIRST RELATIONS WITH AMERICA. 253 tutions or individuals, but do not venture to promise anything more than my best exer- tions. . . . Agassiz little dreamed, as he read this let- ter, how familiar these far-off localities would become to him, or how often, in after years, he would traverse by day and by night the four miles which lay between Boston and his home in Cambridge. Agassiz still sought and received, as we see by the following letter, Humboldt's sympathy in every step of his work. HUMBOLDT TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. BERLIN, May, 1835. I am to blame for my neglect of you, my dear friend, but when you consider the grief which depresses me,1 and renders me unfit to keep up my scientific connections, you will not be so unkind as to bear me any ill-will for my long silence. You are too well aware of my high esteem for your talents and your character — you know too well the affection- ate friendship I bear you — to fear for a mo- ment that you could be forgotten. I have seen the being I loved most, and 1 Owing to the death of his brother, William von Humboldt. 254 LOUIS AGASSIZ. who alone gave me some interest in this arid land, slowly decline. For four long years my brother had suffered from a weakness of all the muscles, which made me always fear that the seat of the trouble was the medulla oblon- gata. Yet his step was firm ; his head was en- tirely clear. The higher intellectual faculties retained all their energy. He was engaged from twelve to thirteen hours a day on his works, reading or rather dictating, for a nerv- ous trembling of the hand prevented him from using a pen. Surrounded by a numerous fam- ily ; living on a spot created, so to speak, by himself, and in a house which he had adorned with antique statues ; withdrawn also from affairs, he was still attached to life. The ill- ness which carried him off in ten days — an inflammation of the chest — was but a secon- dary symptom of his disease. He died with- out pain, with a strength of character and a serenity of mind worthy of the greatest ad- miration. It is cruel to see so nobje an intel- ligence struggle during ten long days against physical destruction. We are told that in great grief we should turn with redoubled energy to the study of nature. The advice is easy to give ; but for a long time even the wish for distraction is wanting. LETTER FROM HUMBOLDT. 255 My brother leaves two works which we in- tend to publish : one upon the languages and ancient Indian civilization of the Asiatic archi- pelago, and the other upon the structure of languages in general, and the influence of that structure upon the intellectual development of nations. This last work has great beauty of style. We shall soon begin the publication of it. My brother's extensive correspondence with all those countries over which his philo- logical studies extended brings upon me just at present, such a multiplicity of occupations and duties that I can only write you these few lines, my dear friend, as a pledge of my constant affection, and, I may also add, my admiration of your eminent works. It is a pleasure to watch the growing renown of those who are dear to us; and who should merit success more than you, whose elevation of character is proof against the temptations of literary self-love? I thank you for the little you have told me of your home life. It is not enough to be praised and recognized as a great and profound naturalist ; to this one must add domestic happiness as well. . . . I am about finishing my long and weari- some work of (illegible) ; a critical examination into the geography of the Middle Ages, of 256 LOUIS AGASSIZ. which fifty sheets are already printed. I will send you the volumes as soon as they appear, in octavo. I devoured your fourth number ; the plates are almost finer than the previous ones ; and the text, though I have only looked it through hastily, interested me deeply, espe- cially the analytical catalogue of Bolca, and the more general and very philosophical views of fishes in general, pp. 57-64. The latter is also remarkable in point of style. . . . M. von Buch, who has just left me, sends you a warm greeting. None the less does he consider the method of issuing your text in fragments from different volumes, altogether diabolical. I also complain a little, though in all humility ; but I suppose it to be connected with the difficulty of concluding any one fam- ily, when new materials are daily accumulat- ing on your hands. Continue then as before. In my judgment, M. Agassiz never does wrong. . . . The above letter, though written in May, did not reach Agassiz until the end of July, when he was again on his way to England, where his answer is dated. LETTER TO HUMBOLDT. 257 AGASSIZ TO HUMBOLDT. (LONDON), October — , 1835. ... I cannot express to you my pleasure in reading your letter of May 10th (which was, unhappily, only delivered to me on my pas- sage through Carlsruhe, at the end of July). . . . To know that I have occupied your thoughts a moment, especially in days of trial and sorrow such as you have had to bear, raises me in my own eyes, and redoubles my hope for the future. And just now such en- couragement is particularly cheering under the difficulties which I meet in completing my task in England. I have now been here nearly two months, and I hope before leaving to finish the description of all that I brought together at the Geological Society last year. Knowing that you are in Paris, however, I cannot resist the temptation of going to see you ; indeed, should your stay be prolonged for some weeks, it would be my most direct path for home. I should like to tell you a little of what I have done, and how the world has gone with me since we last met. ... I have certainly committed an imprudence in throwing myself into an enterprise so vast in proportion to my means as my "Fossil VOL. I. 17 258 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Fishes." But, having begun it, I have no al- ternative ; my only safety is in success. I have a firm conviction that I shall bring my work to a happy issue, though often in the evening I hardly know how the mill is to be turned to-morrow. . . . By a great good fortune for me, the Brit- ish Association, at the suggestion of Buck- land, Sedgwick, and Murchison, has renewed, for the present year, its vote of one hundred guineas toward the facilitating of researches upon the fossil fishes of England, and I hope that a considerable part of this sum may be awarded to me, in which case I may be able to complete the greater number of the drawings I need. If I had obtained in France only half the subscriptions I have had in England, I should be afloat ; but thus far M. Bailliere has only disposed of some fifteen copies. . . . My work advances fairly ; I shall soon have described all the species I know, numbering now about nine hundred. I "need some weeks in Paris for the comparison of several tertiary species with living ones in order to satisfy my- self of their specific identity, and then my task will be accomplished. Next comes the put- ting in order of all my notes. My long va- cations will give me time to do this with the greatest care. . . . OTHER PUBLICATIONS. 259 His second visit to England, during which the above letter was written, was chiefly spent in reviewing the work of his artist, whom he now reinforced with a second draughtsman, M. Weber, the same who had formerly worked with him in Munich. He also attended the • meeting of the British Association in Dublin, stayed a few days at Oulton Park for another look at the collections of Sir Philip Egerton, made a second grand tour among the other fossil fishes of England and Ireland, and re- turned to Neuchatel, leaving his two artists in London with their hands more than full. While Agassiz thus pursued his work on fossil fishes with ardor and an almost perilous audacity, in view of his small means, he found also time for various other investigations. Dur- ing the year 1836, though pushing forward constantly the publication of the " Poissons Fossiles," his "Prodromus of the Class of Echinodermata " appeared in the Memoirs of the Natural History Society of Neuchatel, as well as his paper on the fossil Echini belong- ing to the Neocomien group of the Neuchatel Jura, accompanied by figures. Not long after, he published in the Memoirs of the Helvetic Society his descriptions of fossil Echini pecul- iar to Switzerland, and issued also the first 260 LOUIS AGASSIZ. number of a more extensive work, " Monogra- phic d'Echinodermes." During this year he received a new evidence of the sympathy of the English naturalists, in the Wollaston medal awarded to him by the London Geological Society. The summer of 1836 was an eventful one for Agassiz, — the opening, indeed, of a new and brilliant chapter in his life. The at- tention of the ignorant and the learned had alike been called to the singular glacial phe- nomena of movement and transportation in the Alpine valleys. The peasant had told his strange story of boulders carried on the back of the ice, of the alternate retreat and advance of glaciers, now shrinking to narrower limits, now plunging forward into adjoining fields, by some unexplained power of expansion and contraction. Scientific men were awake to the interest of these facts, but had consid- ered them only as local phenomena. Venetz and Charpentier were the first to detect their wider significance. The former traced the an- cient limits of the Alpine glaciers as defined by the frame-work of debris or loose material they had left behind them ; and Charpentier went farther, and affirmed that all the erratic boulders scattered over the plain of Switzer- GLACIAL RESEARCHES. 261 land and on the sides of the Jura had been thus distributed by ice and not by water, as had been supposed. Agassiz was among those who received this hypothesis as improbable and untenable. Still, he was anxious to see the facts in place, and Charpentier was glad to be his guide. He therefore passed his vacation, during this sum- mer of 1836, at the pretty town of Bex, in the valley of the Rhone. Here he spent a number of weeks in explorations, which served at the same time as a relaxation from his more seden- tary work. He went expecting to confirm his own doubts, and to disabuse his friend Char- pentier of his errors. But after visiting with him the glaciers of the Diablerets, those of the valley of Chamounix, and the moraines of the great valley of the Rhone and its princi- pal lateral valleys, he came away satisfied that a too narrow interpretation of the phenomena was Charpentier's only mistake. During this otherwise delightful summer, he was not without renewed anxiety lest he should be obliged to suspend the publication of the Fossil Fishes for want of means to carry it on. On this account he writes from Bex to Sir Philip Egerton in relation to the sale of his original drawings, the only property he pos- 262 LOUIS AGASSIZ. sessed. " It is absolutely impossible/' he says, " for me to issue even another number until this sale is effected. ... I shall consider my- self more than repaid if I receive, in exchange for the whole collection of drawings, simply what I have expended upon them, provided I may keep those which have yet to be litho- graphed until that be done." Sir Philip made every effort to effect a sale to the British Museum. He failed at the moment, but the collection was finally pur- chased and presented to the British Museum by a generous relative of his own, Lord Fran- cis Egerton. In the mean time, Sir Philip and Lord Cole, in order to make it possible for Agassiz to retain the services of Mr. Dinkel, proposed to pay his expenses while he was drawing such specimens from their own collec- tions as were needed for the work. These drawings were, of course, finally to remain their own property. During his sojourn at Bex, Agassiz's intel- lect and imagination had been deeply stirred by the glacial phenomena. In the winter of 1837, on his return to Neuchatel, he investi- gated anew the slopes of the Jura, and found that the facts there told the same story. Al- though he resumed with unabated ardor his ADDRESS TO THE HELVETIC SOCIETY. 263 various works on fishes, radiates, and mol- lusks, a new chapter of nature was all the while unfolding itself in his fertile brain. When the Helvetic Association assembled at Neuchatel in the following summer, the young president, from whom the members had ex- pected to hear new tidings of fossil fishes, startled them by the presentation of a glacial theory, in which the local erratic phenomena of the Swiss valleys assumed a cosmic sig- nificance. It is worthy of remark here that the first large outlines in which Agassiz, when a young man, planned his intellectual work gave the key-note to all that followed. As the generalizations on which all his future zoological researches were based, are sketched in the Preface to his " Poissons Fossiles," so his opening address to the Helvetic Society in 1837 unfolds the glacial period as a whole, much as he saw it at the close of his life, af- ter he had studied the phenomena on three continents. In this address he announced his conviction that a great ice-period, due to a tem- porary oscillation of the temperature of the globe, had covered the surface of the earth with a sheet of ice, extending at least from the north pole to Central Europe and Asia. " Siberian winter," he says, " established itself 264 LOUIS AGASSIZ. for a time over a world previously covered with a rich vegetation and peopled with large mammalia, similar to those now inhabiting the warm regions of India and Africa. Death en- veloped all nature in a shroud, and the cold, having reached its highest degree, gave to this mass of ice, at the maximum of tension, the greatest possible hardness." In this novel presentation the distribution of erratic boul- ders, instead of being classed among local phenomena, was considered " as one of the ac- cidents accompanying the vast change occa- sioned by the fall of the temperature of our globe before the commencement of our epoch." This was, indeed, throwing the gauntlet down to the old expounders of erratic phe- nomena upon the principle of floods, freshets, and floating ice. Many well-known geologists were present at the meeting, among them Leo- pold von Buch, who could hardly contain his indignation, mingled with contempt, for what seemed to him the view of a youthful and in- experienced observer. One would have liked to hear the discussion which followed, in spe- cial section, between Von Buch, Charpentier, and Agassiz. Elie de Beaumont, who should have made the fourth, did not arrive till later. Difference of opinion, however, never dis- OPPOSITION TO THE GLACIAL THEORY. 265 turbed the cordial relation which existed be- tween Von Buch and his young opponent. In- deed, Agassiz's reverence and admiration for Von Buch was then, and continued through- out his life, deep and loyal. Not alone from the men who had made these subjects their special study, did Agassiz meet with discouragements. The letters of his beloved mentor, Humboldt, in 1837, show how much he regretted that any part of his young friend's energy should be diverted from zoology, to a field of investigation which he then believed to be one of theory rather than of precise demonstration. He was, per- haps, partly influenced by the fact that he saw through the prejudiced eyes of his friend Von Buch. "Over your and Charpentier's moraines," he says, in one of his letters, " Leopold von Buch rages, as you may al- ready know, considering the subject, as he does, his exclusive property. But I too, though by no means so bitterly opposed to new views, and ready to believe that the boulders have not all been moved by the same means, am yet inclined to think the moraines due to more local causes." The next letter shows that Humboldt was seriously anxious lest this new field of activ- 266 LOUIS AGASSIZ. ity, with its fascinating speculations, should draw Agassiz away from his ichthyological re- searches. HTJMBOLDT TO AGASSIZ. BERLIN, December 2, 1837. I have this moment received, my dear friend, by the hand of M. de Werther, the cabinet minister, your eighth and ninth num- bers, with a fine pamphlet of text. I hasten to express my warm thanks, and I congratu- late the public on your somewhat tardy res- olution to give a larger proportion of text. One should flatter neither the king, nor the people, nor one's dearest friend. I maintain, therefore, that no one has told you forcibly enough how the very persons who justly ad- mire your work, constantly complain of this fragmentary style of publication, which is the despair of those who have not the leisure to place your scattered sheets where they belong and disentangle the skein.1 I think you would do well to publish for a while more text than plates. You could do 1 Owing to the irregularity with which he received and was forced to work up his material, Agassiz was often either in advance or in arrears with certain parts of his subject, so that his plates and his text did not keep pace with each other, thus causing his readers much annoyance. LETTER FROM HUMBOLDT. 267 this the better because your text is excellent, full of new and important ideas, expressed with admirable clearness. The charming let- ter (again without a date) which preceded your package impressed me painfully. I see you are ill again ; you complain of congestion of the head and eyes. For mercy's sake take care of your health which is so dear to us. I am afraid you work too much, and (shall I say it frankly?) that you spread your in- tellect over too many subjects at once. I think that you should concentrate your moral and also your pecuniary strength upon this beautiful work on fossil fishes. In so doing you will render a greater service to positive geology, than by these general considerations (a little icy withal) on the revolutions of the primitive world ; considerations which, as you well know, convince only those who give them birth. In accepting considerable sums from England, you have, so to speak, con- tracted obligations to be met only by complet- ing a work which will be at once a monument to your own glory and a landmark in the his- tory of science. Admirable and exact as your researches on other fossils are, your contem- poraries claim from you the fishes above all. You will say that this is making you the slave 268 LOUIS AGASSI Z. of others; perfectly true, but such is the pleasing position of affairs here below. Have I not been driven for thirty-three years to busy myself with that tiresome America, and am I not, even yet, daily insulted because, after publishing thirty - two volumes of the great edition in folio and in quarto, and twelve hun- dred plates, one volume of the historical sec- tion is wanting? We men of letters are the servants of an arbitrary master, whom we have imprudently chosen, who flatters and pets us first, and then tyrannizes over us if we do not work to his liking. You see, my dear friend, I play the grumbling old man, and, at the risk of deeply displeasing you, place my- self on the side of the despotic public. . . . With reference to the general or periodical lowering of the temperature of the globe, I have never thought it necessary, on account of the elephant of the Lena, to admit that sudden frost of which Cuvier used to speak. What I have seen in Siberia, and what has been observed in Captain Beechey's expedition on the northwest coast of America, simply proves that there exists a layer of frozen drift, in the fissures of which (even now) the muscu- lar flesh of any animal which should acciden- tally fall into them would be preserved intact. DISTRUST OF GLACIAL THEORY. 269 It is a slight local phenomenon. To me, the ensemble of geological phenomena seems to prove, not the prevalence of this glacial sur- face on which you would carry along your boulders, but a very high temperature spread- ing almost to the poles, a temperature favor- able to organizations resembling those now living in the tropics. Your ice frightens me, and gladly as I would welcome you here, my dear friend, I think, perhaps, for the sake of your health, and also that you may not see this country, always so hideous, under a sheet of snow and ice (in February), you would do better to come two months later, with the first verdure. This is suggested by a letter received yesterday by M. d'O , which alarmed me a little, because the state of your eyes obliged you to wrrite by another hand. Pray do not think of traveling before you are quite well. I close this letter, feeling sure that it does not contain a line which is not an ex- pression of friendship and of the high esteem I bear you. The magnificence of your last numbers, eight and nine, cannot be told. How admirably executed are your Macropoma, the Ophiopris procerus, Mantell's great beast, the minute details of the Dercetis, Psammodus, . c . the skeletons. . . . There is nothing 270 LOUIS AGASSIZ. like it in all that we possess upon vertebrates. I have also begun to study your text, so rich in well arranged facts ; the monograph of the Lepidostei, the passage upon the bony rays, and, dear Agassiz, I could hardly believe my eyes, sixty-five continuous pages of the third volume, without interruption ! You will spoil the public. But, my good friend, you have already information upon a thousand species ; " claudite jam rivos ! " You say your work can go on if you have two hundred subscrib- ers ; but if you continue to support two travel- ing draughtsmen, I predict, as a practical man, that it cannot go on. You cannot even pub- lish what you have gathered in the last five years. Consider that in attempting to give a review of all the fossil fishes which now exist in collections, you pursue a phantom which ever flies before you. Such a work would not be finished in less than fifteen years, and besides, this now is an uncertain element. Cannot you conquer yourself so far as to finish what you have in your possession at present ? Recall your artists. With the rep- utation you enjoy in Europe, whatever might essentially change your opinion on certain or- ganisms would willingly be sent to you. If you continue to keep two ambassadors in for- ADVICE FROM HUMBOLDT. 271 eign lands, the means you destine for the engraving and printing will soon be absorbed. You will struggle with domestic difficulties, and at sixty years of age (tremble at the sight of this number ! ) you will be as un- certain as you are to-day, whether you pos- sess, even in your collection of drawings, all that is to be found among amateurs. How exhaust an ocean in which the species are indefinitely increasing ? Finish, first, what you have this December, 1837, and then, if the subject does not weary you, publish the supplements in 1847. You must not forget that these supplements will be of two kinds : 1st. Ideas which modify some of your old views. 2d. New species. Only the first kind of supplement would be really desirable. Fur- thermore, you must regain your intellectual independence and not let yourself be scolded any more by M. de Humboldt. Little will it avail you should I vanish from the scene of this world with your fourteenth number ! When I am a fossil in my turn I shall still ap- pear to you as a ghost, having under my arm the pages you have failed to interpolate and the volume of that eternal America which I owe to the public. I close with a touch of fun, in order that my letter may seem a little less 272 LOUIS AGASSIZ. like preaching. A thousand affectionate re- membrances. No more ice, not much of echi- noderms, plenty of fish, recall of ambassadors in partibus, and great severity toward the book-sellers, an infernal race, two or three of whom have been killed under me. A. DE HUMBOLDT. I sigh to think of the trouble my horrible writing will give you. A letter of about the same date from Von Buch shows that, however he might storm at Agassiz's heterodox geology, he was in full sympathy with his work in general. LEOPOLD VON BUCH TO LOULS AGASSIZ. December 22, 1837. . . . Pray reinstate me in the good graces of my unknown benefactor among you. By a great mistake the reports of the Society for- warded to me from Neuchatel have been sent back. As it is well known at the post-office that I do not keep the piles of educational journals sent to me from France, the postage on them being much too heavy for my means, they took it for granted that this journal, the charges on which amounted to several crowns, was of the number. I am very sorry. I do LETTER FROM VON BUCH. 273 not even know the contents of the journal, but I suppose it contained papers of yours, full of genius and ardor. I like your way of looking at nature, and I think you render great service to science by your observations. A right spirit will readily lead you to see that this is the true road to glory, far preferable to the one which leads to vain analogies and speculations, the time for which is long past. I am grieved to hear that you are not well, and that your eyes refuse their service. M. de Humboldt tells me that you are seeking a better climate here, in the month of February. You may find it, perhaps, thanks to our stoves. But as we shall still have plenty of ice in the streets, your glacial opinions will not find a market at that season. I should like to pre- sent you with a memoir or monograph of mine, just published, on Spirifer and Orthis, but I will take good care to let no one pay postage on a work which, by its nature, can have but a very limited interest. ... I will await your arrival to give you these descrip- tions. I am expecting the numbers of your Fossil Fishes, which have not yet come. Hum- boldt often speaks of them to me. Ah ! how much I prefer you in a field which is wholly your own than in one where you break in VOL. I. 18 274 LOUIS AGASSIZ. upon the measured and cautious tread, intro- duced by Saussure in geology. You, too, will reconsider all this, and will yet treat the views of Saussure and Escher with more respect. Everything here turns to infusoria. Ehren- berg has just discovered that an apparently sandy deposit, twenty feet in thickness, under the " Luneburgerheyde," is composed entirely of infusoria of a kind still living in the neigh- borhood of Berlin. This layer rests upon a brown deposit known to be ten feet in thick- ness. The latter consists, for one fifth of the depth, of pine pollen, which burns. The rest is of infusoria. Thus these animals, which the naked eye has not power to discern, have themselves the power to build up mountain chains. CHAPTER IX. 1837-1839: JET. 30-32. Invitation to Professorships at Geneva and Lausanne. — Death of his Father. — Establishment of Lithographic Press at Neuchatel. — Researches upon Structure of Mol- lusks. — Internal Casts of Shells. — Glacial Explorations. — Views of Buckland. — Relations with Arnold Guyot. — Their Work together in the Alps. — Letter to Sir Philip Egerton concerning Glacial Work. — Summer of 1839. — Publication of " Etudes sur les Glaciers." ALTHOUGH Agassiz's daring treatment of the glacial phenomena had excited much oppo- sition and angry comment, it had also made a powerful impression by its eloquence and orig- inality. To this may be partly due the fact that about this time he was strongly urged from various quarters to leave Neuchatel for some larger field. One of the most seductive of these invitations, owing to the affectionate spirit in which it was offered, came through Monsieur de la Rive, in Geneva. 276 LOUIS AGASS2Z. M. AUGUSTE DE LA RIVE TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. GENEVA, May 12, 1836. ... I have not yet received your address. I hope you will send it to me without delay, for I am anxious to bring it before our read- ers. I hope also that you will not forget what you have promised me for the " Bibliotheque Universelle." I am exceedingly anxious to have your cooperation ; the more so that it will reinforce that of several distinguished savants whose assistance I have recently se- cured. If I weary you with a second letter, how- ever, it is not only to remind you of your promise about the " Bibliotheque Universelle," but for another object still more important and urgent. The matter stands thus. Our academic courses have just opened under fa- vorable auspices. The number of students is much increased, and, especially, we have a good many from Germany and England. This circumstance makes us feel more strongly the importance of completing our organization, and of doing this wisely and quickly. I will not play the diplomat with you, but will frankly say, without circumlocution, that you seem to me the one essential, the one indis- LETTER FROM M. DE LA RIVE. 277 pensable man. After having talked with some influential persons here, I feel sure that if you say to me, " I will come," I can obtain for you the following conditions : 1st. A regular salary of three thousand francs, beside the student fees, which, in view of the character of your instruction, your reputation, and the novelty of your course, I place too low at a thousand francs ; of this I am convinced. 2d. The vacant professorship is one of geology and mineralogy, but should you wish it De la Planche will continue to teach the mineralogy, and you will replace it by paleontology, or any other subject which may suit you. . . . Add to this resource that of a popular course for the world outside, ladies and others, which you might give in the winter, as at Neu- chatel. The custom here is to pay fifty francs for the course of from twenty-five to thirty lectures. You will easily see that for such a course you would have at least as large an audience here as at Neuchatel. This is the more likely because there is a demand for these courses, Pictet being dead, and M. Eossi and M. de Castella having ceased to give them. No one has come forward as their heir, fine as the inheritance is ; some are too busy, others have not the kind of talent 278 LOUIS AGASSIZ. needed, and none have attempted to replace these gentlemen in this especial line, one in which you excel, hoth by your gifts and your fortunate choice of a subject more in vogue just now than any other. Come then, to work in this rich vein before others present themselves for the same purpose. Finally, since I must make up your budget, the " Bib- liotheque Universelle," which pays fifty francs a sheet, would be always open to you ; there you could bring the fruits of your produc- tive leisure. Certainly it would be easy for you to make in this way an additional thou- sand francs. Here, then, is a statement, precise and full, of the condition of things, and of what you may hope to find here. The moment is pro- pitious ; there is a movement among us just now in favor of the sciences, and this winter the plan of a large building for our museum and library will be presented to our common council. The work should begin next sum- mer; you well know how much we should value your ideas and your advice on this sub- ject. There may also be question of a direc- tor for the museum, and of an apartment for him in the new edifice ; you will not doubt to whom such a place would be offered. But let INVITATION TO GENEVA. 279 us not draw upon the future ; let us limit our- selves to the present, and see whether what I propose suits you. . . . Come ! let yourself be persuaded. Sacrifice the capital to a provin- cial town. At Berlin, no doubt, you would be happy and honored ; at Geneva, you would be the happiest, the most honored. Look at , who shone as a star of the first magni- tude at Geneva, and who is but a star of sec- ond or third rank in Paris. This, to be sure, would not be your case ; nevertheless, I am satisfied that at Geneva, where you would be a second de Saussure, your position would be still more brilliant. I know that these motives of scientific self-love have little weight with you ; nevertheless, wishing to omit nothing, I give them for what they are worth. But my hope rests far more on the arguments I have first presented ; they come from the heart, and with you the heart responds as readily as the genius. But enough ! I will not fatigue you with farther considerations. I think I have given you all the points necessary for your decision. Be so kind as to let me know as soon as possible what you intend to do. Have the kindness also not to speak of the contents of this letter, and remember that it is not the Rector of the Academy of Geneva, but the 280 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Professor Auguste de la Rive, who writes in his own private person. Promptitude and silence, then, are the two recommendations which I make to you while we await the Yes we so greatly desire. . . . More tempting still must have been the offi- cial invitation received a few months later to a professorship at Lausanne, strengthened as it was by the affectionate entreaties of relations and friends, urging him for the sake of fam- ily ties and patriotism to return to the canton where he had passed his earlier years. But he had cast in his lot with the Neuchatelois and was proof against all arguments. He remained faithful to the post he had chosen until he left it, temporarily as he then believed, to come to America. The citizens of his adopted town expressed their appreciation of his loy- alty to them in a warm letter of thanks, beg- ging, at the same time, his acceptance of the sum of six thousand francs, payable by install- ments during three years. The summer of 1837 was a sad one to Agassiz and to his whole family ; his father died at Concise, carried off by a fever while still a comparatively young man. The pretty parsonage, to which they were so much at- FOUNDING LITHOGRAPHIC PRESS. 281 tached, passed into other hands, and thence- forward the home of Madame Agassiz was with her children, among whom she divided her time. In 1838 Agassiz founded a lithographic printing establishment in Neuchatel, which was carried on for many years under his di- rection. Thus far his plates had been litho- graphed in Munich. Their execution at such a distance involved constant annoyance, and sometimes great waste of time and money, in sending the proofs to and fro for correction. The scheme of establishing a lithographic press, to be in a great degree at his charge, was certainly an imprudent one for a poor man; but Agassiz hoped not only to facilitate his own publications by this means, but also to raise the standard of execution in works of a purely scientific character. Supported partly by his own exertions, partly by the generosity of others, the establishment was almost exclu- sively dependent upon him for its unceasing activity. He was fortunate in securing for its head M. Hercule Nicolet, a very able litho- graphic artist, who had had much experience in engraving objects of natural history, and was specially versed in the recently invented art of chromatic lithography. 282 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Agassiz was now driving all his steeds abreast. Beside his duties as professor, he was printing at the same tune his " Fossil Fishes," his " Fresh-Water Fishes," and his in- vestigations on fossil Echinoderms and Mol- o lusks, — the illustrations for all these various works being under his daily supervision. The execution of these plates, under M. Nicolet's care, was admirable for the period. Professor Arnold Guyot, in his memoir of Agassiz, says of the plates for the "Fresh-Water Fishes" : " We wonder at their beauty, and at their per- fection of color and outline, when we remem- ber that they were almost the first essays of the newly - invented art of lithochromy, pro- duced at a time when France and Belgium were showering rewards on very inferior work of the kind, as the foremost specimens of pro- gress in the art." All this work could hardly be carried on single handed. In 1837 M. Edouard Desor joined Agassiz in Neuchatel, and became for many years his intimate associate in scientific labors. A year or two later M. Charles Vogt also united himself to the band of investiga- tors and artists who had clustered about Agas- siz as their central force. M. Ernest Favre says of this period of his life : "He displayed METHOD FOR STUDY OF MOLLUSKS. 283 during these years an incredible energy, of which the history of science offers, perhaps, no other example." Among his most important zoological re- searches at this time were those upon mol- lusks. His method of studying this class was too original and too characteristic to be passed by without notice The science of conchology had heretofore been based almost wholly upon the study of the empty shells. To Agassiz this seemed superficial. Longing to know more of the relation between the animal and its outer covering, he bethought himself that the inner moulding of the shell would give at least the form of its old inhabitant. For the practical work he engaged an admirable moulder, M. Stahl, who continued to be one of his staff at the lithographic establishment until he became permanently employed at the Jardin des Plantes. With his help and that of M. Henri Ladame, professor of physics and chemistry at Neuchatel, who prepared the del- icate metal alloys in which the first mould was taken, Agassiz obtained casts in which the form of the animals belonging to the shells was perfectly reproduced. This method has since passed into universal use. By its aid he obtained a new means of ascertaining the re- 284 LOUIS AGASSIZ. lations between fossil and living mollusks. It was of vast service to him in preparing his " Etudes critiques sur les Mollusques f ossiles," — a quarto volume with nearly one hundred plates. The following letter to Sir Philip Egerton gives some account of his undertakings at this time, and of the difficulties entailed upon him by their number and variety. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. NEUCHATEL, August 10, 1838. . . . These last months have been a tune of trial to me, and I have been forced to give up my correspondence completely in order to meet the ever-increasing demands of my work. You know how difficult it is to find a quiet moment and an easy mind for writing, when one is pursued by printing or lithographic proofs, and forced besides to prepare unceas- ing occupation for numerous employes. Add to this the close research required by the work of editing, and you surely will find an excuse for my delay. I think I have already written you that in order to have everything under my own eye, I had founded a lithographic estab- lishment at Neuchatel in the hope of avoid- ing in future the procrastinations to which LETTER TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. 285 my proofs were liable when the work was done at Munich. ... I hope that my new publica- tions will be sufficiently well received to jus- tify me in supporting an establishment unique of its kind, which I have founded solely in the interest of science and at the risk of my peace and my health. If I give you all these details, it is simply to explain my silence, which was caused not by pure negligence, but by the de- mands of an undertaking in the success of which my very existence is involved. . . . This week I shall forward to the Secretary of the British Association for the Advancement of Science all that I have been able to do thus far, being unable to bring it myself, as I had hoped. You would oblige me greatly if you would give a look at these different works, which may, I hope, have various claims on your interest. First, there is the tenth number of the "Fossil Fishes," though the whole supply of publisher's copies will only be sent a few weeks later. Then there are the seven first plates of my sea-urchins, en- graved with much care and with many details. A third series of plates relates to critical stud- ies on fossil mollusks, little or erroneously known, and on their internal casts. This is a quite novel side of the study of shells, and 286 LOUIS AGASSIZ. will throw light on the organization of ani- mals known hitherto only by the shell. I have made a plaster collection of them for the Geological Society. They have been packed some time, but my late journey to Paris has prevented me from forwarding them till now. As soon as I have a moment, I shall make out the catalogue and send it on. When you go to London, do not fail to examine them ; the result is curious enough. Finally, the plates for the first number of my " Fresh - Water Fishes " are in great part finished, and also included in my package for Newcastle. . . . The plates are executed by a new process, and printed in various tints on different stones, re- sulting in a remarkable uniformity of coloring in all the impressions. . . . Such are the new credentials with which I present myself, as I bring my thanks for the honor paid to me by my nomination for the vacancy in the Royal Society of London. If unbounded devotion to the interests of science constituted a sufficient title to such a distinc- tion, I should be the less surprised at the announcement contained in your last letter. The action of the Royal Society, so flattering to the candidate of your choice, has satisfied a desire which I should hardly have dared to GLACIAL EXPLORATIONS. 287 form for many a year, — that of becoming a member of a body so illustrious as the Royal Society of London. . . . Each time I write I wish I could close with the hope of seeing you soon ; but I must work incessantly ; that is my lot, and the happiness I find in it gives a charm to my occupations however numerous they may be. ... While Agassiz's various zoological works were thus pressed with unceasing activity, the glaciers and their attendant phenomena, which had so captivated his imagination, were ever present to his thought. In August of the year 1838, a year after he had announced at the meeting of the Helvetic Society his com- prehensive theory respecting the action of ice over the whole northern hemisphere, he made two important excursions in the Alps. The first was to the valley of Hassli, the second to the glaciers of Mont Blanc. In both he was accompanied by his scientific collaborator, M. Desor, whose intrepidity and ardor hardly fell short of his own ; by Mr. Dinkel as artist, and by one or two students and friends. These excursions were a kind of prelude to his more prolonged sojourns on the Alps, and to the series of observations car- 288 LOUIS AGASSIZ. ried on by him and his companions, which at- tracted so much attention in later years. But though Agassiz carried with him, on these first explorations, only the simplest means of investigation and experiment, they were no amateur excursions. On these first Alpine journeys he had in his mind the sketch he meant to fill out. The significance of the phenomena was already clear to him. What he sought was the connection. Following the same comparative method, he intended to track the footsteps of the ice as he had gath- ered and put together the fragments of his fossil fishes, till the scattered facts should fall into their natural order once more and tell their story from beginning to end. In his explorations of 1838 he found every- where the same phenomena ; the grooved and polished and graven surfaces and the rounded and modeled rocks, often lying far above and beyond the present limits of the glaciers; the old moraines, long deserted by the ice, but de- fining its ancient frontiers ; the erratic blocks, transported far from their place of origin and disposed in an order and position unexplained by the agency of water. These excursions, though not without their dangers and fatigues, were full of charm for ATTEMPT AT AN ENGLISH LETTER. 289 men who, however serious their aims, were still young enough to enter like boys into the spirit of adventure. Agassiz himself was but thirty-one ; an ardent pedestrian, he delighted in feats of walking and climbing. His friend Dinkel relates that one day, while pausing at Grindelwald for refreshment, they met an el- derly traveler who asked him, after listening awhile to their gay talk, in which appeals were constantly made to " Agassiz," if that was perhaps the son of the celebrated professor of Neuchatel. The answer amazed him ; he could hardly believe that the young man be- fore him was the naturalist of European rep- utation. In connection with this journey oc- curs the first attempt at an English letter found among Agassiz's papers. It is addressed to Buckland, and contains this passage : "Since I saw the glaciers I am quite of a snowy hu- mor, and will have the whole surface of the earth covered with ice, and the whole prior creation dead by cold. In fact, I am quite satisfied that ice must be taken [included] in every complete explanation of the last changes which occurred at the surface of Europe." Considered in connection with their subse- quent work together in the ancient ice-beds and moraines of England, Scotland, Ireland, VOL I. 19 290 LOUIS AGASSIZ. and Wales, it is curious to find Buckland an- swering : "I am sorry that I cannot entirely adopt the new theory you advocate to explain transported blocks by moraines ; for suppos- ing it adequate to explain the phenomena of Switzerland, it would not apply to the gran- ite blocks and transported gravel of England, which I can only explain by referring to cur- rents of water." During the same summer Mrs. Buckland writes from Interlaken, in the course of a journey in Switzerland with her husband. . . . "We have made a good tour of the Oberland and have seen glaciers, etc., but Dr. Buckland is as far as ever from agree- ing with you." We shall see hereafter how completely he became a convert to Agassiz's glacial theory in its widest acceptation. One friend, scarcely mentioned thus far in this biography, was yet, from the beginning, the close associate of Agassiz's glacier work. Arnold Guyot and he had been friends from boyhood. Their university life separated them for a time, Guyot being at Berlin while Agas- siz was at Munich, and they became colleagues at Neuchatel only after Agassiz had been for some years established there. From that tune forward there was hardly any break in their intercourse ; they came to America at about RELATIONS WITH ARNOLD GUYOT. 291 the same time, and finally settled as profes- sors, the one at Harvard College, in Cam- bridge, Massachusetts, and the other at the College of New Jersey, in Princeton. They shared all their scientific interests ; and when they were both old men, Guyot brought to Agassiz' s final undertaking, the establishment of a summer school at Penikese, a coopera- tion as active and affectionate as that he had given in his youth to his friend's scheme for establishing a permanent scientific summer station in the high Alps. In a short visit made by Agassiz to Paris in the spring of 1838 he unfolded his whole plan to Guyot, then residing there, and per- suaded him to undertake a certain part of the investigation. During this very summer of 1838, therefore, while Agassiz was tracing the ancient limits of the ice in the Bernese Ober- land and the Haut Valais, and later, in the valley of Chamounix, Guyot was studying the structure and movement of the ice during a six weeks' tour in the central Alps. At the conclusion of their respective journeys they met to compare notes, at the session of the Geological Society of France, at Porrentruy, where Agassiz made a report upon the gen- eral results of his summer's work; while Guyot 292 LOUIS AGASSIZ. read a paper, the contents of which have never been fully published, upon the move- ment of glaciers and upon their internal fea- tures, including the laminated structure of the ice, the so-called blue bands, deep down in the mass of the glacier.1 In the succeeding years of their glacial researches together, Guyot took for his share the more special geological prob- lems, the distribution of erratic boulders and of the glacial drift, as connected with the an- cient extension of the glaciers. This led him away from the central station of observation to remoter valleys on the northern and south- ern slopes of the Alps, where he followed the descent of the glacial phenomena to the plains of central Europe on the one side and to those of northern Italy on the other. We therefore seldom hear of him with the band of workers who finally settled on the glacier of the Aar, because his share of the undertaking became a more isolated one. It was nevertheless an integral part of the original scheme, which was carried on connectedly to the end, the results of the work in the different departments being constantly reported and compared. So much was this the case, that the intention of Agas- 1 See Memoir of Louis Agassiz, by Arnold Guyot, written for the United States National Academy of Sciences, p. 38. WORK IN THE ALPS. 293 siz had been to embody the whole in a publi- cation, the first part of which should contain the glacial system of Agassiz ; the second the Alpine erratics, by Guyot; while the third and final portion, by E. Desor, should treat of the erratic phenomena outside of Switzerland. The first volume alone was completed. Un- looked for circumstances made the continuation of the work impossible, and the five thousand specimens of the erratic rocks of Switzerland collected by Professor Guyot, in preparation for his part of the publication, are now depos- ited in the College of New Jersey, at Prince- ton. In the following summer of 1839 Agassiz took the chain of Monte Rosa and Matterhorn as the field of a larger and more systematic observation. On this occasion, the usual party consisting of Agassiz, Desor, M. Bettanier, an artist, and two or three other friends, was joined by the geologist Studer. Up to this time he had been a powerful opponent of Agassiz's views, and his conversion to the gla- cial theory during this excursion was looked upon by them all as a victory greater than any gained over the regions of ice and snow. Some account of this journey occurs in the following letter. 294 LOUIS AGASSIZ. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. NEUCHATEL, September 10, 1839. . . . Under these circumstances, I thought I could not do better than to pass some weeks in the solitude of the high Alps ; I lived about a fortnight in the region of the glaciers, ascending some new field of ice every day, and trying to scale the sides of our highest peaks. I thus examined in succession all the glaciers descending from the majestic summits of Monte Rosa and the Matterhorn, whose nu- merous crests form a most gigantic amphithe- atre, which lifts itself above the everlasting snow. Afterward I visited the sea of ice which, under the name of the glacier of Aletsch, flows from the Jungfrau, the Mb'nch, and the Eiger toward Brieg ; thence I went to the glacier of the Rhone, and from there, establishing my headquarters at the Hospice of the Grimsel, I followed the glacier of the Aar to the foot of the Finsteraarhorn. There I ascertained the most important fact that I now know concerning the advance of gla- ciers, namely, that the cabin constructed by Hugi in 1827, at the foot of the Absch- wung, is now four thousand feet lower down. Slight as is the inclination of the glacier, this ETUDES SUR LES GLACIERS. 295 cabin has been carried on by the ice with as- tonishing rapidity, and still more important is it that this rapidity has been on the increase; for in 1830 the cabin was only some hundred feet from the rock, in 1836 it had already passed over a distance from [word torn away] of two thousand feet, and in the last three years it has again doubled that distance. Not only have I confirmed my views upon glaciers and their attendant phenomena, on this new ground, but I have completed my examina- tion of a number of details, and have had be- sides the satisfaction of convincing one of my most severe opponents of the exactness of my observations, namely, M. Studer, who accom- panied me on a part of these excursions. . . . The winter of 1840 was fully occupied by the preparation for the publication of the " Etudes sur les Glaciers," which appeared before the year was out, accompanied by an atlas of thirty-two plates. The volume of text consisted of an historical resume of all that had previously been done in the study of glaciers, followed by an account of the obser- vations of Agassiz and his companions during the last three or four years upon the glaciers of the Alps. Their structure, external aspect, 296 LOUIS AGASSIZ. needles, tables, perched blocks, gravel cones, rifts, and crevasses, as well as their movements, mode of formation, and internal temperature, were treated in succession. But the most in- teresting chapters, from the author's own point of view, and those which were most novel for his readers, were the concluding ones upon the ancient extension of the Swiss glaciers, and upon the former existence of an immense, unbroken sheet of ice, which had once covered the whole northern hemisphere. No one before had drawn such vast conclu- sions from the local phenomena of the Alpine valleys. " The surface of Europe," says Agas- siz, " adorned before by a tropical vegetation and inhabited by troops of large elephants, enormous hippopotami, and gigantic carniv- ora, was suddenly buried under a vast mantle of ice, covering alike plains, lakes, seas and plateaus. Upon the life and movement of a powerful creation fell the silence of death. Springs paused, rivers ceased to flow, the rays of the sun, rising upon this frozen shore (if, indeed, it was reached by them), were met only by the breath of the winter from the north and the thunders of the crevasses as they opened across the surface of this icy sea." * The author goes on to state that on 1 Etudes sur les Glaciers. Chapter xviii. p. 315. ICE PERIOD. 297 the breaking up of this universal shroud the ice must have lingered longest in mountainous strongholds, and that all these fastnesses of retreat became, as the Alps are now, centres of distribution for the broken debris and rocky fragments which are found scattered with a kind of regularity along certain lines, and over given areas in northern and central Europe. How he followed out this idea in his subsequent investigations will be seen here- after. CHAPTER X. 1840-1842: ^T. 33-35. Summer Station on the Glacier of the Aar. — Hotel des Neuchatelois. — Members of the Party. — Work on the Glacier. — Ascent of the Strahleck and the Siedelhorn. — Visit to England. — Search for Glacial Remains in Great Britain. — Roads of Glen Roy. — Views of English Natu- ralists concerning Agassiz's Glacial Theory. — Letter from Humboldt. — Winter Visit to Glacier. — Summer of 1841 on the Glacier. — Descent into the Glacier. — Ascent of the Jungfrau. IN the summer of 1840 Agassiz made his first permanent station on the Alps. Hitherto the external phenomena, the relation of the ice to its surroundings, and its influence upon them, had been the chief study. Now the glacier itself was to be the main subject of in- vestigation, and he took with him a variety of instruments for testing temperatures : barome- ters, thermometers, hygrometers, and psychom- eters ; beside a boring apparatus, by means of which self -registering thermometers might be lowered into the heart of the glacier. To these were added microscopes for the study of HOTEL DBS NEUCHATELOIS. 299 such insects and plants as might be found in these ice-bound regions. The Hospice of the Grimsel was selected as his base of supplies, and as guides Jacob Leuthold and Johann Wahren were chosen. Both of these had ac- companied Hugi in his ascension of the Fin- steraarhorn in 1828, and both were therefore thoroughly familiar with all the dangers of Alpine climbing. The lower Aar glacier was to be the scene of their continuous work, and the centre from which their ascents of the neighboring summits would be made. Here, on the great median moraine, stood a huge boulder of micaceous schist. Its upper sur- face projected so as to form a roof, and by closing it in on one side with a stone wall, leveling the floor by a judicious arrangement of flat slabs, and rigging a blanket in front to serve as a curtain across the entrance, the whole was presently transformed into a rude hut, where six persons could find sleeping- room. A recess, sheltered by the rock out- side, served as kitchen and dining-room ; while an empty space under another large boulder was utilized as a cellar for the keeping of pro- visions. This was the abode so well known afterward as the Hotel des Neuchatelois. Its first occupants were Louis Agassiz, Edouard 300 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Desor, Charles Vogt, Frangois de Pourtales, Ce'lestin Nicolet, and Henri Coulon. It af- forded, perhaps, as good a shelter as they could have found in the old cabin of Hugi, where they had hoped to make their tempo- rary home. In this they were disappointed, for the cabin had crumbled on its last glacial journey. The wreck was lying two hundred feet below the spot where they had seen the walls still standing the year before. The work was at once distributed among the different members of the party, — Agas- siz himself, assisted by his young friend and favorite pupil, Frangois de Pourtales, retain- ing for his own share the meteorological ob- servations, and especially those upon the inter- nal temperature of the glaciers.1 To M. Vogt fell the microscopic study of the red snow and the organic life contained in it; to M. Nicolet, the flora of the glaciers and the sur- rounding rocks ; to M. Desor, the glacial phe- nomena proper, including those of the mo- raines. He had the companionship and assist- 1 See "Tables of Temperature, Measurements," etc., in Agassiz's Systems Glaciaire. These results are also recorded in a volume entitled Sejours dans les Glaciers, by Edouard Desor, a collection of very bright and entertaining articles upon the excursions and sojourns made in the Alps, during successive summers, by Agassiz and his scientific staff. WORK ON THE GLACIER. 301 ance of M. Henri Coulon in the long and laborious excursions required for this part of the work. This is not the place for scientific details. For the results of Agassiz's researches on the Alpine glaciers, to which he devoted much of his time and energy during ten years, from 1836 to 1846, the reader is referred to his two larger works on this subject, the " Etudes sur les Glaciers," and the " Systeme Glaciaire." Of the work accomplished by him and his companions during these years this slight sum- mary is given by his friend Guyot.1 " The position of eighteen of the most prominent rocks on the glacier was determined by care- ful triangulation by a skillful engineer, and measured year after year to establish the rate of motion of every part. The differences in the rate of motion in the upper and lower part of the glacier, as well as in different sea- sons of the year, was ascertained ; the amount of the annual melting was computed, and all the phenomena connected with it studied. All the surrounding peaks, — the Jungfrau, the Schreckhorn, the Finsteraarhorn, most of them 1 See Biographical Sketch, published by Professor A. Guyot, under the auspices of the United States National Academy. 302 LOUIS AGASSIZ. until then reputed unscalable, — were ascend- ed, and the limit of glacial action discovered ; in short all the physical laws of the glacier were brought to light." We now return to the personal narrative. After a number of days spent in the study of the local phenomena, the band of workers turned their attention to the second part of their programme, namely, the ascent of the Strahleck, by crossing which and descending on the other side, they intended to reach Grin- delwald. One morning, then, toward the end of August, their guides, according to agree- ment, aroused them at three o'clock, — an hour earlier than their usual roll-call. The first glance outside spread a general chill of disappointment over the party, for they found themselves beleaguered by a wrall of fog on every side. But Leuthold, as he lighted the fire and prepared breakfast, bade them not despair, — the sun might make all right. In a few moments, one by one, the summits of the Schreckhorn, the Finsteraarhorn, the Ober- aarhorn, the Altmaner, the Scheuchzerhorn, lighted by the first rays of the sun, came out like islands above the ocean of mist, which softly broke away and vanished with the ad- vancing light. In a,bou'o three hours they ASCENT OF THE STRAHLECK. 303 reached the base of the Strahleck. Their two guides, Leuthold and Wahren, had engaged three additional men for this excursion, so that they now had five guides, none of whom were superfluous, since they carried with them va- rious barometric instruments which required careful handling. They began the ascent in single file, but the slopes soon became so steep and the light snow (in which they floundered to the knees at every step) so deep, that the guides resorted to the usual method in such cases of tying them all together. The two head guides alone, Leuthold and Wahren, re- mained detached, clearing the snow in front of them, cutting steps in the ice, and giving warning, by cry and gesture, of any hidden danger in the path. At nine o'clock, after an hour's climbing, they stepped upon the small plateau, evenly covered with unbroken snow, formed by the summit of the Strahleck. The day had proved magnificent. With a clear sky above them, they looked down upon the valley of Grindelwald at their feet, while around and below them gathered the Schei- deck and the Faulhorn, the pyramidal outline of the Niesen, and the chain of the Stock- horn. In front lay the great masses of the Eiger and the Monch, while to the southwest 304 LOUIS AGASSIZ. the Jungfrau rose above the long chain of the Viescherhorner. The first pause of silent wonder and delight, while they released them- selves from their cords and arranged their in- struments, seems to have been succeeded by an outburst of spirits ; for in the journal of the youngest of the party, FranQois de Pour- tales, then a lad of seventeen, we read : " The guides began to wrestle and we to dance, when suddenly we saw a female chamois, fol- lowed by her young, ascending a neighboring slope, and presently four or five more stretched their necks over a rock, as if to see what was going on. Breathless the wrestlers and the dancers paused, fearing to disturb by the slightest movement creatures so shy of human approach. They drew nearer until within easy gunshot distance, and then galloping along the opposite ridge disappeared over the summit." The party passed more than an hour on the top of the Strahleck, making observations and taking measurements. Then having rested and broken their fast with such provisions as they had brought, they prepared for a descent, which proved the more rapid, since much of it was a long slide. Tied together once more, they slid, wherever they found it possible to exchange the painful and difficult walking RETURN TO THE AAR GLACIER. 305 for this simpler process. " Once below these slopes of snow," says the journal of young de Pourtales again, " rocks almost vertical, or narrow ledges covered with grass, served us as a road and brought us to the glacier of the Grindelwald. To reach the glacier itself we traversed a crevasse of great depth, and some twenty feet wide, on a bridge of ice, one or two feet in width, and broken toward the end, where we were obliged to spring across. Once on the glacier the rest was nothing. The race was to the fastest, and we were soon on the path of the tourists." Reaching the village of Grindelwald at three o'clock in the afternoon, they found it difficult to persuade the people at the inn that they had left the glacier of the Aar that morning. From Grindelwald they returned by the Scheideck to the Grim- sel, visiting on their way the upper glacier of Grindelwald, the glacier of Schwartzwald, and that of Rosenlaui, in order to see how far these had advanced since their last visit to them. After a short rest at the Hospice of the Grim- sel, Agassiz returned with two or three of his companions to their hut on the Aar glacier for the purpose of driving stakes into the holes previously bored in the ice. He hoped by means of these stakes to learn the follow- VOL. I. 20 306 LOUIS AGASSIZ. ing year what had been the rate of movement of the glacier. The summer's work closed with the ascent of the Siedelhorn. In all these ascents, the utmost pains was taken to ascertain how far the action of the ice might be traced upon these mountain peaks and the limits determined at which the polished sur- faces ceased, giving place to the rough, an- gular rock which had never been modeled by the ice. Agassiz had hardly returned from the Alps when he started for England. He had long believed that the Highlands of Scotland, the hilly Lake Country of England, and the moun- tains of Wales and Ireland, would present the same phenomena as the valleys of the Alps. Dr. Buckland had offered to be his guide in this search after glacier tracks, as he had for- merly been in the hunt after fossil fishes in Great Britain. When, therefore, the meeting of the British Association at Glasgow, at which they were both present, was over, they started together for the Highlands. In a lec- ture delivered by Agassiz, at his summer school at Penikese, a few months before his death, he recurred to this journey with the enthusiasm of a young man. Recalling the scientific isolation in which he then stood, op- GLACIER HUNT IN GREAT BRITAIN. 307 posed as he was to all the prominent geolo- gists of the day, he said : " Among the older naturalists, only one stood by me. Dr. Buck- land, Dean of Westminster, who had come to Switzerland at my urgent request for the ex- press purpose of seeing my evidence, and who had been fully convinced of the ancient ex- tension of ice there, consented to accompany me on my glacier hunt in Great Britain. We went first to the Highlands of Scotland, and it is one of the delightful recollections of my life that as we approached the castle of the Duke of Argyll, standing in a valley not un- like some of the Swiss valleys, I said to Buck- land : ( Here we shall find our first traces of glaciers ; ' and, as the stage entered the val- ley, we actually drove over an ancient termi- nal moraine, which spanned the opening of the valley." In short, Agassiz found, as he had anticipated, that in the mountains of Scotland, Wales, and the north of England, the valleys were in many instances traversed by terminal moraines and bordered by lateral ones, as in Switzerland. Nor were any of the accompanying phenomena wanting. The characteristic traces left by the ice, as well known to him now as the track of the game to the hunter; the peculiar lines, furrows, 308 LOUIS AGASSIZ. and grooves ; the polished surfaces, the roches moutonnees ; the rocks, whether hard or soft, cut to one level, as by a rigid instrument ; the unstratified drift and the distribution of loose material in relation to the ancient glacier- beds, — all agreed with what he already knew of glacial action. He visited the famous " roads of Glen Roy " in the Grampian Hills, where so many geologists had broken a lance in defense of their theories of subsidence and upheaval, of ancient ocean -levels and sea- beaches, formed at a time when they believed Glen Roy and the adjoining valleys to have been so many fiords and estuaries. To Agas- siz, these parallel terraces explained them- selves as the shores of a glacial lake, held back in its bed for a time by neighboring gla- ciers descending from more sheltered valleys. The terraces marked the successively lower levels at which the water stood, as these bar- riers yielded, and allowed its gradual escape.1 The glacial action in the whole neighborhood was such as to leave no doubt in the mind of 1 For details, see a paper by Agassiz on " The Glacial The- ory and its Recent Progress " in the Edinburgh New Philo- sophical Journal, October, 1842, accompanied by a map of the Glen Roy region, and also an article entitled " Parallel Roads of Glen Roy, in Scotland," in the second volume of Agassiz's Geological Sketches. GLACIAL RESULTS IN GREAT BRITAIN. 309 Agassiz that Glen Roy and the adjoining glens, or valleys, had been the drainage-bed for the many glaciers formerly occupying the western ranges of the Grampian Hills. He returned from his tour satisfied that the moun- tainous districts of Great Britain had all been centres of glacial distribution, and that the drift material and the erratic boulders, scat- tered over the whole country, were due to ex- actly the same causes as the like phenomena in Switzerland. On the 4th of November, 1840, he read a paper before the Geological Society of London, giving a summary of the scientific results of their excursion, followed by one from Dr. Buckland, who had become an ardent convert to his views. Apropos of this meeting, Dr. Buckland writes in advance as follows : — TAYMOUTH CASTLE, October 15, 1840. . . . Lyell has adopted your theory in to to ! ! ! On my showing him a beautiful cluster of moraines, within two miles of his father's house, he instantly accepted it, as solving a host of difficulties that have all his life embarrassed him. And not these only, but similar moraines and detritus of moraines, that cover half of the adjoining counties are 310 LOUIS AGASSIZ. explicable on your theory, and he has con- sented to my proposal that he should imme- diately lay them all down on a map of the county and describe them in a paper to be read the day after yours at the Geological So- ciety. I propose to give in my adhesion by reading, the same day with yours, as a sequel to your paper, a list of localities where I have observed similar glacial detritus in "Scotland, since I left you, and in various parts of Eng- land. There are great reefs of gravel in the lime- stone valleys of the central bog district of Ireland. They have a distinct name, which I forget. No doubt they are moraines ; if you have not, ere you get this, seen one of them, pray do so.1 But it will not be worth while to go out of your way to see more than one ; all the rest must follow as a corollary. I trust you will not fail to be at Edinboro' on the 20th, and at Sir W. Trevelyan's on the 24th. . . . A letter of later date in the same month 1 Agassiz was then staying at Florence Court, the seat of the Earl of Enniskillen, in County Fermanagh, Ireland. While there he had an opportunity of studying most interest- ing glacial phenomena. LETTER TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. 311 shows that Agassiz felt his views to be slowly gaining ground among his English friends. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. LONDON, November 24, 1840. ... Our meeting on Wednesday passed off very well ; none of my facts were dis- turbed, though Whewell and Murchison at- tempted an opposition ; but as their objec- tions were far-fetched, they did not produce much effect. I was, however, delighted to have some appearance of serious opposition, because it gave me a chance to insist upon the exactness of my observations, and upon the want of solidity in the objections brought against them. Dr. Buckland was truly elo- quent. He has now full possession of this subject ; is, indeed, completely master of it. •I am happy to tell you that everything is definitely arranged with Lord Francis,1 and that I now feel within myself a courage which doubles my strength. I have just written to thank him. To-morrow I shall devote to the fossils sent me by Lord Enniskillen, a list of which I will forward to you. . . . 1 Apropos of the sale of his original drawings of fossil fishes to Lord Francis Egerton. 312 LOUIS AGASSIZ. We append here, a little out of the regular course, a letter from Humboldt, which shows that he too was beginning to look more leni- ently upon Agassiz's glacial conclusions. HUMBOLDT TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. BERLIN, August 15, 1840. I am the most guilty of mortals, my dear friend. There are not three persons in the world whose remembrance and affection I value more than yours, or for whom I have a warmer love and admiration, and yet I allow half the year to pass without giving you a sign of life, without any expression of my warm gratitude for the magnificent gifts I owe to you.1 I am a little like my republican friend who no longer answers any letters because he does not know where to begin. I receive on an average fifteen hundred letters a year. I never dictate. I hold that resort in horror. How dictate a letter to a scholar for whom one has a real regard ? I allow myself to be drawn into answering the persons I know least, whose wrath is the most menacing. My nearer friends (and none are more dear to me 1 Probably the plates of the Fresh - Water Fishes and other illustrated publications. LETTER FROM HUMBOLDT. 313 than yourself) suffer from my silence. I count with reason upon their indulgence. The tone of your excellent letters shows that I am right. You spoil me. Your letters continue to be always warm and affectionate. I receive few like them. Since two thirds of the letters ad- dressed to me (partly copies of letters written to the king or the ministers) remain unan- swered, I am blamed, charged with being a parvenu courtier, an apostate from science. This bitterness of individual claims does not diminish my ardent desire to be useful. I act oftener than I answer. I know that I like to do good, and this consciousness gives me tranquillity in spite of my over burdened life. You are happy, my dear Agassiz, in the more simple and yet truly proud position which you have created for yourself. You ought to take satisfaction in it as the father of a family, as an illustrious savant, as the originator and source of so many new ideas, of so many great and noble conceptions. Your admirable work on the fossil fishes draws to a close. The last number, so rich in discoveries, and the prospectus, explaining the true state of this vast publication, have soothed all irritation regarding it. It is because I am so attached to you that I rejoice in the calmer 314 LOUIS AGASS1Z. atmosphere you have thus established about you. The approaching completion of the fossil fishes delivers me also from the fear that a too great ardor might cause you irrep- arable losses. You have shown not only what a talent like yours can accomplish, but also how a noble courage can triumph over seem- ingly insurmountable obstacles. In what words shall I tell you how greatly our admiration is increased by this new work of yours on the Fresh- Water Fishes ? Nothing has appeared more admirable, more perfect in drawing and color. This chromatic lithog- raphy resembles nothing we have had thus far. What taste has directed the publica- tion ! Then the short descriptions accompany- ing each plate add singularly to the charm and the enjoyment of this kind of study. Accept my warm thanks, my dear friend. I not only delivered your letter and the copy with it to the king, but I added a short note on the merit of such an undertaking. The counselor of the Royal Cabinet writes me officially that the king has ordered the same number of copies of the Fresh -Water Fishes as% of the Fossil Fishes ; that is to say, ten copies. M. de Werther has already received the order. This is, to be sure, but a slight help; still, LETTER FROM HUMBOLDT. 315 it is all that I have been able to obtain, and these few copies, with the king's name as sub- scriber, will always be useful to you. I cannot close this letter without asking your pardon for some expressions, too sharp, perhaps, in my former letters, about your vast geological conceptions. The very exaggera- tion of my expressions must have shown you how little weight I attached to my objections. . . . My desire is always to listen and to learn. Taught from my youth to believe that the organization of past times was somewhat tropical in character, and startled therefore at these glacial interruptions, I cried " Heresy ! " at first. But should we not always listen to a friendly voice like yours ? I am interested in whatever is printed on these topics ; so, if you have published anything at all complete lately on the ensemble of your geological ideas, have the great kindness to send it to me through a book-seller. . . . Shall I tell you anything of my own poor and superannuated works? The sixth volume is wanting to my " Geography of the Fifteenth Century " (Examen Critique). It will appear this summer. I am also printing the second volume of a new work to be entitled " Central Asia." It is not a second edition of " Asiatic 316 LOUIS AGASS1Z. Fragments," but a new and wholly different work. The thirty-five sheets of the last vol- ume are printed, but the two volumes will only be issued together. You can judge of the difficulty of printing at Paris and correct- ing proofs here, — at Poretz or at Toplitz. I am just now beginning to print the first num- ber of my physics of the world, under the title of " Cosmos : " in German, " Ideen zur einer physischen Weltbeschreibung." It is in no sense a reproduction of the lectures I gave here. The subject is the same, but the presentation does not at all recall the form of a popular course. As a book, it has a some- what graver and more elevated style. A " spoken book " is always a poor book, just as lectures read are poor however well pre- pared. Published courses of lectures are my detestation. Gotta is also printing a volume of mine in German, " Physikalische geogra- phische Erinnerungen." Many unpublished things concerning the volcanoes of the Andes, about currents, etc. And all this at the age when one begins to petrify ! It is very rash ! May this letter prove to you and to Madame Agassiz that I am petrifying only at the ex- tremities, — the heart is still warm. Retain for me the affection which I hold so dear. A. DE HUMBOLDT. WINTER VISIT TO GLACIERS. 317 In the following winter, or, rather, in the early days of March, 1841, Agassiz visited, in company with M. Desor, the glacier of the Aar and that of Rosenlaui. He wished to examine the stakes planted the summer before on the glacier of the Aar, and to compare the winter and summer temperature within as well as without the mass of ice. But his chief object was to ascertain whether water still flowed from beneath the glaciers during the frosts of winter. This fact would have a direct bearing upon the theory which referred the melting and movement of the glaciers chiefly to their lower surface, explain- ing them by the central heat of the earth as their main cause. Satisfied as he was of the fallacy of this notion, Agassiz still wished to have the evidence of the glacier itself. The journey was, of course, a difficult one at such a season, but the weather was beautiful, and they accomplished it in safety, though not without much suffering. They found no water except the pure and limpid water from springs that never freeze. The glacier lay dead in the grasp of winter. The results of this journey, tables of temperature, etc., are recorded in the " Systeme Glaciaire." In E. Desor's " Sejours dans les Glaciers " 318 LOUIS AGASSIZ. is found an interesting description of the in- cidents of this excursion and the appearance of the glaciers in winter. In ascending the course of the Aar they frequently crossed the shrunken river on natural snow bridges, and approaching the Handeck over fearfully steep slopes of snow they had some difficulty in finding the thread of water which was all that remained of the beautiful summer cascade. On the glacier of the Aar they found the Hotel des Neuchatelois buried in snow, while the whole surface of the glacier as well as the surrounding peaks, from base to summit, wore the same spotless mantle. The Finsteraar- horn alone stood out in bold relief, black against a white world, its abrupt slopes afford- ing no foothold for the snow. The scene was far more monotonous than in summer. Cre- vasses, with their blue depths of ice, were closed ; the many-voiced streams were still ; the moraines and boulders were only here and there visible through the universal shroud. The sky was without a cloud, the air trans- parent, but the glitter of the uniform white surface was exquisitely painful to the eyes and skin, and the travelers were obliged to wrap their heads in double veils. They found the glacier of Rosenlaui less enveloped in SOJOURN OF 1841 ON THE GLACIER. 319 snow than that of the Aar ; and though the magnificent ice-cave, so well known to trav- elers for its azure tints, was inaccessible, they could look into the vault and see that the habitual bed of the torrent was dry. The journey was accomplished in a week without any untoward accident. In the summer of 1841 Agassiz made a longer Alpine sojourn than ever before. The special objects of the season's work were the internal structure of these vast moving fields of ice, the essential conditions of their origin and continued existence, the action of water within them as influencing their movement, and their own agency in direct contact with the beds and walls of the valleys they occu- pied. The fact of their former extension and their present oscillations might be considered as established. It remained to explain these facts with reference to the conditions prevail- ing within the mass itself. In short, the in- vestigation was passing from the domain of geology to that of physics. Agassiz, who was as he often said of himself no physicist, was the more anxious to have the cooperation of the ablest men in that department, arid to share with them such facilities for observation and such results as he had thus far accumu- 320 LOUIS AGASSIZ. lated. In addition to his usual collaborators, M. Desor and M. Vogt, he had, therefore, in- vited as his guest, during part of the season, the distinguished physicist, Professor James D. Forbes, of Edinburgh, who brought with him his friend, Mr. Heath, of Cambridge.1 M. Escher de la Linth took also an active part in the work of the later summer. To his working corps Agassiz had added the foreman of M. Kahli, an engineer at Bienne, to whom he had confided his plans for the summer, and who furnished him with a skilled workman to direct the boring operations, assist in measure- ments, etc. The artist of this year was M. Jaques Burkhardt, a personal friend of Agas- siz, and his fellow-student at Munich, where he had spent some time at the school of art. As a draughtsman he was subsequently associated with Agassiz in his work at various times, and when they both settled in America Mr. Burk- hardt became a permanent member of Agas- siz's household, accompanied him on his jour- neys, and remained with him in relations of uninterrupted and affectionate regard till his own death in 1867. He was a loyal friend 1 As the impressions of Mr. Forbes were only made known in connection with his own later and independent researches it is unnecessary to refer to them here. WORK IN SUMMER OF 1841. 321 and a warm-hearted man, with a thread of humor running through his dry good sense, which made him a very amusing and attractive companion. As it was necessary, in view of his special programme of work, to penetrate below the surface of the glacier, and reach, if possible, its point of contact with the valley bottom, Agassiz had caused a larger boring appara- tus than had been used before, to be trans- ported to the old site on the Aar glacier. The results of these experiments are incorpo- rated in the " Systeme Glaciaire," published in 1846, with twenty-four folio plates and two maps. They were of the highest inter- est with reference to the internal structure and temperature of the ice and the penetra- bility of its mass, pervious throughout, as it proved, to air and water. On one occasion the boring-rod, having been driven to a depth of one hundred and ten feet, dropped sud- denly two feet lower, showing that it had passed through an open space hidden in the depth of the ice. The release of air-bubbles at the same time gave evidence that this gla- cial cave, so suddenly broken in upon, was not hermetically sealed to atmospheric influ- ences from without. VOL. I. 21 322 LOUIS AGASSTZ. Agassiz was not satisfied with the report of his instruments from these unknown re- gions. He determined to be lowered into one of the so-called wells in the glacier, and thus to visit its interior in person. For this pur- pose he was obliged to turn aside the stream which flowed into the well into a new bed which he caused to be dug for it. This done, he had a strong tripod erected over the open- ing, and, seated upon a board firmly attached by ropes, he was then let down into the well, his friend Escher lying flat on the edge of the precipice, to direct the descent and listen for any warning cry. Agassiz especially de- sired to ascertain how far the laminated or ribboned structure of the ice (the so-called blue bands) penetrated the mass of the gla- cier. This feature of the glacier had been observed and described by M. Guyot (see p. 292), but Mr. Forbes had called especial at- tention to it, as in his belief connected with the internal conditions of the glacier. It was agreed, as Agassiz bade farewell to his friends on this curious voyage of discovery, that he should be allowed to descend until he called out that they were to lift him. He was low- ered successfully and without accident to a depth of eighty feet. There he encountered DESCENT INTO THE GLACIER. 323 an unforeseen difficulty in a wall of ice which divided the well into two compartments. He tried first the larger one, but finding it split again into several narrow tunnels, he caused himself to be raised sufficiently to enter the smaller, and again proceeded on his downward course without meeting any obstacle. Wholly engrossed in watching the blue bands, still visible in the glittering walls of ice, he was only aroused to the presence of approaching danger by the sudden plunge of his feet into water. His first shout of distress was misun- derstood, and his friends lowered him into the ice-cold gulf instead of raising him. The sec- ond cry was effectual, and he was drawn up, though not without great difficulty, from a depth of one hundred and twenty-five feet. The most serious peril of the ascent was caused by the huge stalactites of ice, between the points of which he had to steer his way. Any one of them, if detached by the friction of the rope, might have caused his death. He afterward said : " Had I known all its dangers, perhaps I should not have started on such an adventure. Certainly, unless induced by some powerful scientific motive, I should not advise any one to follow my example." On this per- ilous journey he traced the laminated structure 324 LOUIS AGASSIZ. to a depth of eighty feet, and even beyond, though with less distinctness. The summer closed with their famous as- cent of the Jungfrau. The party consisted of twelve persons : Agassiz, Desor, Forbes, Heath, and two travelers who had begged to join them, — M. de Chatelier, of Nantes, and M. de Pury, of Neuchatel, a former pupil of Agassiz. The other six were guides ; four beside their old and tried friends, Jacob Leu- thold and Johann Wahren. They left the hos- pice of the Grimsel on the 27th of August, at four o'clock in the morning. Crossing the Col of the Oberaar they descended to the snowy plateau which feeds the Viescher gla- cier. In this grand amphitheatre, walled in by the peaks of the Viescherhorner, they rested for their midday meal. In crossing these fields of snow, while walking with per- fect security upon what seemed a solid mass, they observed certain window-like openings in the snow. Stooping to examine one of them, they looked into an immense open space, filled with soft blue light. They were, in fact, walking on a hollow crust, and the small win- dow was, as they afterward found, opposite a large crevasse on the other side of this ice- cavern, through which the light entered, flood- DELA Y AT THE START. 325 ing the whole vault and receiving from its icy walls its exquisite reflected color.1 Once across the fields of snow and neve, a fatiguing walk of five hours brought them to the chalets of Meril,2 where they expected to sleep. The night which should have prepared them for the fatigue of the next day was, however, disturbed by an untoward accident. The ladder left by Jacob Leuthold when last here with Hugi in 1832, nine years before, and upon which he depended, had been taken away by a peasant of Viesch. Two messen- gers were sent in the course of the night to the village to demand its restoration. The first returned unsuccessful ; the second was the bearer of such threats of summary pun- ishment from the whole party that he carried his point, and appeared at last with the re- covered treasure on his back. They had, in the mean while, lost two hours. They should have been on their road at three o'clock; it was now five. Jacob warned them therefore that they must make all speed, and that any one who felt himself unequal to a forced 1 The effect is admirably described by M. Desor in his account of this excursion, Sejours dans les Glaciers, p. 367. 2 Sometimes Moril, but I have retained the spelling of M. . — E. C. A. 326 LOUIS AGASSIZ. inarch should stay behind. No one responded to his suggestion, and they were presently on the road. Passing Lake Meril, with its miniature ice- bergs, they reached the glacier of the Aletsch and its snow-fields, where the real difficulties and dangers of the ascent were to begin. In this great semicircular space, inclosed by the Jungfrau, the Monch, and the lesser peaks of this mountain group, lies the Aletsch reser- voir of snow or neVe. As this spot presented a natural pause between the laborious ascent already accomplished and the immense decliv- ities which lay before them yet to be climbed, they named it Le Repos, and halted there for a short rest. Here they left also every need- less incumbrance, taking only a little bread and wine, in case of exhaustion, some meteor- ological instruments, and the inevitable lad- der, axe, and ropes of the Alpine climber. On their left, to the west of the amphitheatre, a vast passage opened between the Jungfrau and the Kranzberg, and in this could be dis- tinguished a series of terraces, one above the other. The story is the usual one, of more or less steep slopes, where they sank in the softer snow or cut their steps in the icy sur- faces ; of open crevasses, crossed by the lad- ASCENT OF THE JUNGFRAU. 327 der, or the more dangerous ones, masked by snow, over which they trod cautiously, tied together by the rope. But there was nothing to appall the experienced mountaineer with firm foot and a steady head, until they reached a height where the summit of the Jungfrau detached itself in apparently inaccessible iso- lation from all beneath or around it. To all but the guides their farther advance seemed blocked by a chaos of precipices, either of snow and ice or of rock. Leuthold remained however quietly confident, telling them he clearly saw the course he meant to follow. It began by an open gulf of unknown depth, though not too wide to be spanned by their ladder twenty-three feet in length. On the other side of this crevasse, and immediately above it, rose an abrupt wall of icy snow. Up this wall Leuthold and another guide led the way, cutting steps as they went. When half way up they lowered the rope, holding one end, while their companions fastened the other to the ladder, so that it served them as a kind or hand-rail, by which to follow. At the top they found themselves on a terrace, beyond which a far more moderate slope led to the Col of Roththal, overlooking the Aletsch valley on one side, the Roththal on the other. 328 LOUIS AGASSIZ. From this point the ascent was more and more steep and very slow, as every step had to be cut. Their difficulties were increased, also, by a mist which gathered around them, and by the intense cold. Leuthold kept the party near the border of the ridge, because there the ice yielded more readily to the stroke of the axe ; but it put their steadiness of nerve to the greatest test, by keeping the precipice constantly in view, except when hid- den by the fog. Indeed, they could drive their alpenstocks through the overhanging rim of frozen snow, and look sheer down through the hole thus made to the amphithe- atre below. One of the guides left them, un- able longer to endure the sight of these prec- ipices so close at hand. As they neared their goal they feared lest the mist might, at the last, deprive them of the culminating moment for which they had braved such dangers. But suddenly, as if touched by their perseverance, says M. Desor, the veil of fog lifted, and the summit of the Jungfrau, in its final solitude, rose before them. There was still a certain distance to be passed before they actually reached the base of the extreme peak. Here they paused, riot without a certain hesitation, for though the summit lay but a few feet PORTRAIT OF JACOB LEUTHOLD. Front a portrait by J. Burkhardt. ON THE SUMMIT. 329 above them, they were separated from it by a sharp and seemingly inaccessible ridge. Even Agassiz, who was not easily discouraged, said, as he looked up at this highest point of the fortress they had scaled : " We can never reach it." For all answer, Jacob Leuthold, their intrepid guide, flinging down every- thing which could embarrass his movements, stretched his alpenstock over the ridge as a grappling pole, and, trampling the snow as he went, so as to flatten his giddy path for those who were to follow, was in a moment on the top. To so steep an apex does this famous peak narrow, that but one person can stand on the summit at a time, nor was even this possible till the snow was beaten down. Re- turning on his steps, Leuthold, whose quiet, unflinching audacity of success was conta- gious, assisted each one to stand for a few moments where he had stood. The fog, the effect of which they had so much feared, now lent something to the beauty of the view from this sublime foothold. Masses of vapor rolled up from the Roththal on the southwest, but, instead of advancing to envelop them, paused at a little distance arrested by some current from the plain. The temperature being be- low freezing point, the drops of moisture in 330 LOUIS AGASSIZ. this wall of vapor were congealed into ice- crystals, which glittered like gold in the sun- light and gave back all the colors of the rain- bow. When all the party were once more assem- bled at the base of the peak, Jacob, whose resources never failed, served to each one a little wine, and they rested on the snow before beginning their perilous descent. Of living things they saw only a hawk, poised in the air above their heads ; of plants, a few li- chens, where the surface of the rock was ex- posed. It was four o'clock in the afternoon before they started on their downward path, turning their faces to the icy slope, and feel- ing for the steps behind them, some seven hundred in all, which had been cut in ascend- ing. In about an hour they reached the Col of the Roththal, where the greatest diffi- culties of the ascent had begun and the greatest dangers of the descent were over. So elated were they by the success of the day, and so regardless of lesser perils after those they had passed through, that they were now inclined to hurry forward incautiously. Ja- cob, prudent when others were rash, as he was bold when others were intimidated, con- stantly called them to order with his : " Hub- RETURN TO THE HOSPICE. 331 schle ! nur immer hiibschle ! " (" Gently ! al- ways gently ! ") At six o'clock they were once more at Le Repos, having retraced their steps in two hours over a distance which had cost them six in going. Evening was now falling, but daylight was replaced by moonlight, and when they reached the glacier its whole surface shone with a soft silvery lustre, broken here and there by the gigantic shadow of some neighboring mountain thrown black across it. At about nine o'clock, just as they had passed that part of the glacier which was, on account of the frequent crevasses, the most dangerous, they were cheered by the sound of a distant jodel. It was the call of a peas- ant who had been charged to meet them with provisions, at a certain distance above Lake Meril, in case they should be overcome by hunger and fatigue. The most acceptable thing he brought was his great wooden bucket, filled with fresh milk. The picture of the party, as they stood around him in the moonlight, dipping eagerly into his bucket, and drinking in turn until they had exhausted the supply, is so vivid, that one shares their good spirits and their enjoyment. Thus re- freshed, they started on the last stage of 332 LOUIS AGASS1Z. their journey, three leagues of which yet lay before them, and at half-past eleven arrived at the chalets of Me'ril, which they had left at dawn. On the morrow the party broke up, and Agassiz and Desor, accompanied by their friend, M. Escher de la Linth, returned to the Grimsel, and after a day's rest there re- paired once more to the Hotel des Neuchate- lois. They remained on the glacier until the 5th of September, spending these few last days in completing their measurements, and in planting the lines of stakes across the glacier, to serve as a means of determining its rate of movement during the year, and the com- parative rapidity of that movement at certain fixed points. Thus concluded one of the most eventful seasons Agassiz and his companions had yet passed upon the Alps.1 1 Though quoting his exact language only in certain in- stances, the account of this and other Alpine ascensions de- scribed above has been based upon M. E. Desor's Sejours dans les Glaciers. His very spirited narratives, added to my own recollections of what I had heard from Mr. Agassiz himself on the same subject, have given me my material. — E. C. A. CHAPTER XI. 1842-1843: ^T. 35-36. Zoological Work uninterrupted by Glacial Researches.— Various Publications. — " Nomenclator Zoologicus." — " Bibliographia Zoologize et Geologise." — Correspondence with English Naturalists. — Correspondence with Hum- boldt. — Glacial Campaign of 1842. — Correspondence with Prince de Canino concerning Journey to United States. — Fossil Fishes from the Old Red Sandstone. — Glacial Campaign of 1843. — Death of Leuthold, the Guide. ALTHOUGH his glacier work was now so prominent a feature of Agassiz's scientific life, his zoological studies, especially his ich- thyological researches, and more especially his work on fossil fishes, went on with little inter- ruption. His publications upon Fossil Mol- lusks,1 upon Tertiary Shells,2 upon Living and Fossil Echinoderms,3 with many smaller mon- ographs on special subjects, were undertaken 1 Etudes Critiques sur les Mollusques Fossi7es,4nos., 4°, with 100 plates. 2 Iconographie des Coquilles Tertiaires repute'es identiques sur les vivanSy 1 no., 4°, 14 plates. 8 Monographic d'Echinodermes vivans et fossiles, 4 nos., 4°, with 37 plates. 334 LOUIS AGASsrz. and completed during the most active period of his glacial investigations. More surprising is it to find him, while pursuing new lines of investigation with passionate enthusiasm, en- gaged at the same time upon works seemingly so dry and tedious as his " Nomenclator Zo- ologieus," and his " Bibliographia Zoologies et Geologic." The former work, a large quarto volume with an Index,1 comprised an enumeration of all the genera of the animal kingdom, with the etymology of their names, the names of those who had first proposed them, and the date of their publication. He obtained the cooperation of other naturalists, submitting each class as far as possible for revision to the leaders in their respective departments. In his letter of presentation to the library of the Neuchatel Academy, addressed to M. le Baron de Chambrier, President of the Academic Council, Agassiz thus describes the Nomenclator. ..." Have the kindness to accept for the library of the Academy the fifth number of a work upon the sources of zoological criti- cism, the publication of which I have just begun. It is a work of patience, demanding 1 The Index was also published separately as an octavo. NOMENCLATOR AND BIBLIOGRAPHIA. 335 long and laborious researches. I had con- ceived the plan in the first years of my stud- ies, and since then have never lost sight of it. I venture to believe it will be a barrier against the Babel of confusion which tends to over- whelm the domain of zoological synonymy. My book will be called ' Nomenclator Zoolog- icus.s The Bibliographia (4 volumes, 8°) was in some measure a complement of the Nomen- clator, and contained a list of all the authors named in the latter, with notices of their works. It appeared somewhat later, and was published by the Ray Society in England, in 1848, after Agassiz had left Europe for the United States. The material for this work also had been growing upon his hands for years. Feeling more and more the impor- tance of such a register as a guide for stu- dents, he appealed to naturalists in ah1 parts of Europe for information upon the scientific bibliography of their respective countries, and at last succeeded in cataloguing, with such completeness as was possible, all known works and all scattered memoirs on zoology and geology. Unable to publish this costly but unremunerative material, he was delighted to 336 LOUIS AGASSIZ. give it up to the Kay Society. The first three volumes were edited with corrections and additions by Mr. H. E. Strickland, who died before the appearance of the fourth vol- ume, which was finally completed under the care of his father-in-law, Sir William Jar- dine. The ability, so eminently possessed by Agas- siz of dealing with a number of subjects at once, was due to no superficial versatility. To him his work had but one meaning. It was never disconnected in his thought, and therefore he turned from his glaciers to his fossils, and from the fossil to the living world, with the feeling that he was always dealing with kindred problems, bound together by the same laws. Nowhere is this better seen than in the records of the scientific society of Neu- chatel, the society he helped to found in the first months of his professorship, and to which he always remained strongly attached, being a constant attendant at its sessions from 1833 to 1846. Here we find him from month to month, with philosophic breadth of thought, treating of animals in their widest relations, or describing minute structural details with the skill of a specialist. He presents organized beings in their geological succession, in their VARIETY OF RESEARCH. 337 geographical distribution, in their embryonic development. He reviews and remodels laws of classification. Sometimes he illustrates the fossil by the living world, sometimes he finds the key to present phenomena in the remote past. He reconstructs the history of the gla- cial period, and points to its final chapter in the nearest Alpine valleys, connecting these facts again with like phenomena in distant parts of the globe. But however wide his range and however various his topics, under his touch they are all akin, all coordinate parts of a whole which he strives to under- stand in its entirety. A few extracts from his correspondence will show him in his dif- ferent lines of research at this time. The following1 letter is from Edward Forbes, O ' one of the earliest explorers of the deep-sea fauna. Agassiz had asked him for some help in his work upon echinoderms. EDWARD FORBES TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. 21 LOTHIAN ST., EDINBURGH, February 13, 1841. ... A letter from you was to me one of the greatest of pleasures, and with great de- light (though, I fear, imperfectly) I have exe- cuted the commission you gave me. It should have been done much sooner had not the VOL. L 22 338 LOUIS AGASSIZ. storms been so bad in the sea near this that, until three days ago, I was not able to procure a living sea-urchin from which to make the drawings required, . . . You have made all the geologists glacier-mad here, and they are turning Great Britain into an ice-house. Some amusing and very absurd attempts at opposi- tion to your views have been made by one or two pseudo - geologists ; among others, poor , who has read a paper at the Royal So- ciety here, maintaining that all the appear- ances you refer to glaciers were caused by blocks of ice which floated this way in the Del- uge ! and that the fossils of the pleistocene strata were mollusks, etc., which, climbing upon the ice-blocks, were carried to warmer seas against their will ! ! To my mind, one of the best proofs of the truth of your views lies in the decidedly arctic character of the pleis- tocene fauna, which must be referred to the glacier time, and by such reference is easily understood. I mean during the summer to collect data on that point, in order to present a mass of geological proofs of your theory. Dr. Traill tells me you are proposing to visit England again during the coming sum- mer. If you do, I hope we shall meet, when I shall have many things to show you, which LETTER FROM SIR R. MURCHISON. 339 time did not permit when you were here. I look anxiously for the forth-coming number of your history of the Echinodermata. . . . FROM SIR RODERICK MURCHISON. June 13, 1842. . . . Your letters have given me great pleas- ure : first, in assuring me that your zeal in ichthyology is undiminished, and that you are about to give such striking proofs of it to the British Association ; and next that you still pursue with enthusiasm your admirable re- searches upon the glaciers. I should be charmed to put myself under your guidance for a walk on the glaciers of the Aar, but I hardly dare promise it yet. . . . Even were I to make every haste, I doubt if it be possible to reach your Swiss meeting in time. It is just possible that I may find you in your gla- cial cantonment after your return, but even this will depend upon circumstances over which I have no control. I send this letter to you by my friend, Ad- miral Sir Charles Malcolm, who passes through Neuchatel on his way to Geneva. Accom- panying it is a copy of my last discourse, which I request you to accept and to read all parts of it. You will see that I have grappled 340 LOUIS AGASSIZ. honestly and according to my own faith with your ice, but have never lost sight of your great merit. My concluding paragraph will convince you and all your friends that if I am wrong it is not from any preconceived no- tions, but only because I judge from what you will call incomplete evidence. Your " Venez voir ! " still sounds in my ears. . . . Murchison remained for many years an op- ponent of the glacial theory in its larger appli- cation. In the discourse to which the above letter makes allusion (Address at the Anni- versary Meeting of the Geological Society of London, 1842 x) is this passage : " Once grant to Agassiz that his deepest valleys of Switzer- land, such as the enormous Lake of Geneva, were formerly filled with snow and ice, and I see no stopping place. From that hypothesis you may proceed to fill the Baltic and the northern seas, cover southern England and half of Germany and Russia with similar icy sheets, on the surfaces of which all the northern boul- ders might have been shot off. So long as the greater number of the practical geologists of Europe are opposed to the wide extension of 1 Extract from Report in vol. 33 of the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal. MURCHISON ON THE GLACIAL THEORY. 341 a terrestrial glacial theory, there can be little risk that such a doctrine should take too deep a hold of the mind. . . . The existence of glaciers in Scotland and England (I mean in the Alpine sense) is not, at all events, estab- lished to the satisfaction of what I believe to be by far the greater number of British geolo- gists." Twenty years later, with rare candor, Mur- chison wrote to Agassiz as follows ; by its con- nection, though not by its date, the extract is in place here : " I send you my last anniver- sary address, which I wrote entirely myself ; and I beg you to believe that in the part of it that refers to the glacial period, and to Europe as it was geographically, I have had the sin- cerest pleasure in avowing that I was wrong in opposing as I did your grand and original idea of my native mountains. Yes ! I am now convinced that glaciers did descend from the mountains to the plains as they do now in Greenland." During the summer of 1842, at about the same date with Murchison's letter disclaiming the glacial theory, Agassiz received, on the other hand, a new evidence, and one which must have given him especial pleasure, of the favorable impression his views were making in some 'quarters in England. 342 LOUIS AGASS1Z. FROM DR. BUCKLAND. OXFORD, July 22, 1842. . . . You will, I am sure, rejoice with me at the adhesion of C. Darwin to the doctrine of ancient glaciers in North Wales, of which I send you a copy, and which was communicated to me by Dr. Tritten, during the late meeting at Manchester, in time to be quoted by me versus Murchison, when he was proclaiming the exclusive agency of floating icebergs in drifting erratic blocks and making scratched and polished surfaces. It has raised the gla- cial theory fifty per cent., as far as relates to glaciers descending inclined valleys ; but Hop- kins and the Cantabrigians are still as obsti- nate as ever against allowing the power of ex- pansion to move ice along great distances on horizontal surfaces. . . . The following is the letter referred to above. C. DARWIN TO DR. TRITTEN. Yesterday (and the previous days) I had some most interesting work in examining the marks left by extinct glaciers. I assure you, an extinct volcano could hardly leave more evident traces of its activity and vast powers. DARWIN ON ANCIENT GLACIERS. 343 I found one with the lateral moraine quite perfect, which Dr. Buckland did not see. Pray if you have any communication with Dr. Buck- land give him my warmest thanks for having guided me, through the published abstract of his memoir, to scenes, and made me under- stand them, which have given me more de- light than I almost remember to have experi- enced since I first saw an extinct crater. The valley about here and the site of the inn at which I am now writing must once have been covered by at least 800 or 1,000 feet in thick- ness of solid ice ! Eleven years ago I spent a whole day in the valley where yesterday every- thing but the ice of the glaciers was palpably clear to me, and I then saw nothing but plain water and bare rock. These glaciers have been grand agencies. I am the more pleased with what I have seen in North Wales, as it convinces me that my view of the distribution of the boulders on the South American plains, as effected by floating ice, is correct. I am also more convinced that the valleys of Glen Roy and the neighboring parts of Scotland have been occupied by arms of the sea, and very likely (for in that point I cannot, of course, doubt Agassiz and Buckland) by gla- ciers also. 344 LOUIS AGASSIZ. It continued to be a grief to Agassiz that Humboldt, the oldest of all his scientific friends, and the one whose opinion he most reverenced, still remained incredulous. Hum- boldt's letters show that Agassiz did not will- ingly renounce the hope of making him a con- vert. Agassiz's own letters to Humboldt are missing from this time onward. Overwhelmed with occupation, and more at his ease in his relations with the older scientific men, he had ceased to make the rough drafts in which his earlier correspondence is recorded. HUMBOLDT TO AGASSIZ. BERLIN, March 2, 1842. . . . When one has been so long separated, even accidentally, from a friend as I have been from you, my dear Agassiz, it is dif- ficult to find beginning or end to a letter. The kindly remembrance which you send me is evidence that my long silence has not seemed strange to you. ... It would be wasting words to tell you how I have been prevented, by the distractions of my life, al- ways increasing with old age, from acknowl- edging the admirable things received from you, — upon living and fossil fishes, echino- derms, and glaciers. My admiration of your HUMBOLDTS VIEWS ON ICE PERIOD. 345 boundless activity, of your beautiful intellect- ual life, increases with every year. This ad- miration for your work and your bold excur- sions is based upon the most careful reading of all the views and investigations, for which I have to thank you. This very week I have read with great satisfaction your truly philo- sophical address, and your long treatise in Cotta's fourth " Jahresschrift." Even L. von Buch confessed that the first half of your treatise, the living presentation of the succes- sion of organized beings, was full of truth, sagacity, and novelty. I in no way reproach you, my dear friend, for the urgent desire expressed in all your letters, that your oldest friends should accept your comprehensive geological view of your ice-period. It is very noble and natural to wish that what has impressed us as true should also be recognized by those we love. ... I believe I have read and compared all that has been written for and against the ice- period, and also upon the transportation of boulders, whether pushed along or carried by floods or gliding over slopes. My own opin- ion, as you know, can have no weight or au- thority, since I have not myself seen the most decisive points. Indeed I am, perhaps 346 LOUIS AGASSIZ. wrongly, inclined to look upon all geological theories as having their being in a mythical region, in which, with the progress of phys- ics, the phantasms are modified century by century. But the " elephants caught in the ice," and Cuvier's " instantaneous change of climate," seem to me no more intelligible to- day than when I wrote my Asiatic fragments. According to all that we know of the de- crease of heat in the earth, I cannot under- stand such a change of temperature in a space of time which does not also allow for the decaying of flesh. I understand much better how wolves, hares, and dogs, should they fall to-day into clefts of the frozen re- gions of Northern Siberia (and the so-called " elephant-ice " is in plain prose only porphy- ritic drift mixed with ice-crystals, true drift material), might retain their flesh and mus- cles. . . . But I am only a grumbling re- bellious subject in your kingdom. ... Do not be vexed with a friend who is more than ever impressed with your services to geology, your philosophical views of nature, your pro- found knowledge of organized beings. . . . With old attachment and the warmest friendship, your A. DE HUMBOLDT. AGASSI Z TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. 347 In the same strain is this extract from an- other letter of Humboldt's, written two or three months later. . . . " < Grace from on high/ says Madame de Sevigne', ( comes slowly.' I especially de- sire it for the glacial period and for that fatal cap of ice which frightens me, child of the equator that I am. My heresy, of little im- portance, since I have seen nothing, does not, I assure you, my dear Agassiz, diminish my ardent desire that all your observations should be published. ... I rejoice in the good news you give me of the fishes. I should pain you did I add that this work of yours, by the light it has shed on the organic development of animals, makes the true foundation of your glory." . . . LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIR PHILIP EGERTON. NEUCHATEL, June, 1842. ... I am hard at work on the fishes of the " Old Red," and will send you at Manchester a part at least of the plates, with a general sum- mary of the species of that formation. I aim to finish the work with such care that it shall mark a sensible advance in ichthyology. I hope it will satisfy you. . . . You ask me how I intend to finish my Fossil Fishes ? As f ol- 348 LOUIS AGASSIZ. lows : As soon as the number on the species of the " Old Red " is finished, I shall complete the general outline of the work as I did with volume 4, in order that the arrangement and character of all the families in the four orders may be studied in their zoological affinities, with their genera and principal species. But as this outline can no longer contain the in- numerable species now known to me, I take up monographically the species from the dif- ferent geological formations in the order of the deposits, and publish as many supple- ments as there are great formations rich in fossil fishes. I shall limit myself to the species described in the body of the work, merely adding the description of the new species in each deposit, and such additions as I may have to make for those already known. In this way, those who wish to study fossil fishes from the zoological stand-point can turn to the work in the original form, while those who wish to study them in their geological relations can confine themselves to the sup- plements. By means of double registers at the end of each volume, these two distinct parts of the work will be again united as a complete whole. This is the only plan I have been able to devise by which I could publish NEW HOME ON THE GLACIER. 349 in succession all my materials without burden- ing my first subscribers, who will thus be free to accept the supplements or not, as they pre- fer. Should you have occasion to mention this arrangement to the friends of fossil ich- thyology, pray do so ; it seems to me for the interest of the matter that it should be known. ... I propose to resume with new zeal my researches upon the fossil fishes as soon as I return from an excursion I wish to make in July and August to the glacier of the Aar, where I hope, by a last visit this year, to con- clude my labors on this subject. You will be glad to learn that the beautiful barometer you gave me has been my faithful companion in the Alps. ... I have the pleasure to tell you that the King of Prussia has made me a hand- some gift of nearly £200 for the continuance of my glacial work. I feel, therefore, the greater certainty of completing what remains for me to do. ... The campaign of 1842 opened on the 4th of July. The boulder had ceased to be a safe shelter, and was replaced by a rough frame cabin covered with canvas. If the party had some regrets in leaving their pic- turesque hut beneath the rock, the greater 350 LOUIS AGASSIZ. comfort of the new abode consoled them. It had several divisions. A sleeping - place for the guides and workmen was partitioned off from a middle room occupied by Agassiz and his friends, while the front space served as dining-room, sitting-room, and laboratory. This outer apartment boasted a table and one or two benches ; even a couple of chairs were kept as seats of honor for occasional guests. A shelf against the wall and a few pegs ac- commodated books, instruments, coats, etc., and a plank floor, on which to spread their blankets at night, was a good exchange for the frozen surface of the glacier.1 1 In bidding farewell to the boulder which had been the first " Hotel des Neuchatelois " we may add a word of its farther fortunes. It had begun to split in 1841, and was completely rent asunder in 1844, after which frost and rain completed its dismemberment. Strange to say, during the last summer (1884) certain fragments of the mass have been found, inscribed with the names of some of the party ; one of the blocks bearing beside names, the mark No. 2. The ac- count says : " The middle stone, the one numbered 2, was at the intersecting point of two lines drawn from the Pavilion Dollfuss to the Scheuchzerhorn on the one part, and from the Rothhorn to the Thierberg on the other." According to the measurements taken by Agassiz, the Hotel des Neuchate- lois in 1840 stood at 797 metres from the promontory of Abschwung. We are thus enabled, by referring to the large glacier map of Wild and Stengel, to compare the present with the then position of the stone, and thereby ascertain the progress of the glacier since the time in question. Thus the SUMMER OF 1842 ON THE GLACIER. 351 Mr. Wild, an engineer of known ability, was now a member of their party, as a topo- graphical survey was to be one of the chief objects of the summer's work. The results of this survey, which was continued during two summers, are embodied in the map accom- panying Agassiz's " Systeme Glaciaire." Ex- periments upon the extent and connection of the net-work of capillary fissures that admit- ted water into the interior of the glaciers, oc- cupied Agassiz's own attention during a great part of the summer. In order to ascertain this, colored liquids were introduced into the glacier by means of boring, and it was found that they threaded their way through the mass of the ice and reappeared at lower points with astonishing rapidity. A gallery was cut at a depth of ten metres below the surface, through a wall of ice intervening between two cre- vasses. The colored liquid poured into a hole above soon appeared on the ceiling of the gallery. The experimenters were surprised to find that at night the same result was obtained, and that the liquid penetrated from the surface to the roof of the gallery even more quickly boulder still contributes something toward the sequel of the work begun by those who once found shelter beneath it. — E. C. A. 352 LOUIS AGASSIZ. than during the day. This was explained by the fact that the fissures were then free from any moisture arising from surface melting, so that the passage through them was unim- peded.1 The comparative rate of advance in the different parts of the glacier was ascertained this summer with greater precision than before. The rows of stakes planted in a straight line across the glacier by Agassiz and Escher de la Linth, in the previous September, now de- scribed a crescent with the curve turned to- ward the terminus of the glacier, showing, contrary to the expectation of Agassiz, that the centre moved faster than the sides. The 1 Distrust has been thrown upon these results by the fail- ure of more recent attempts to repeat the same experiments. In reference to this, Agassiz himself says : " The infiltra- tion has been denied in consequence of the failure of some experiments in which an attempt was made to introduce colored fluids into the glacier. To this I can only answer that I succeeded completely myself in the self -same experi- ment which a later investigator found impracticable, and that I see no reason why the failure of the latter attempt should cast a doubt upon the success of the former. The explana- tion of the difference in the result may perhaps be found in the fact that as a sponge gorged with water can admit no more fluid than it already contains, so the glacier, under cer- tain circumstances, and especially at noonday in summer, may be so soaked with water that all attempts to pour colored fluids into it would necessarily fail." — See Geological Sketches, by L. Agassiz, p. 236. SECOND STATION ON THE AAR GLACIER. MODE OF FORMATION OF CREVASSES. 353 correspondence of the curve in the stratifica- tion with that of the line of stakes confirmed this result. The study of the stratification of the snow was a marked feature of the sea- son's work, and Agassiz believed, as will be seen by a later letter, that he had established this fact of glacial structure beyond a doubt. The origin and mode of formation of the crevasses also especially occupied the observ- ers. On the 7th of August, Agassiz had an opportunity of watching this phenomenon in its initiation. Attracted to a certain spot on the glacier by a commotion among his work- men, he found them alarmed at the singu- lar noises and movements in the ice. " I heard," he says, " at a little distance a sound like the simultaneous discharge of fire-arms ; hurrying in the direction of the noise, it was repeated under my feet with a movement like that of a slight earthquake ; the ground seemed to shift and give way under me, but now the sound differed from the preceding, and resembled a crumbling of rocks, without, however, any perceptible sinking of the sur- face. The glacier actually trembled, never- theless ; for a block of granite three feet in diameter, perched on a pedestal two feet high, suddenly fell down. At the same instant a VOL. I. 23 354 LOUIS AGASSIZ. crack opened between my feet and ran rap- idly across the glacier in a straight line." On this occasion Agassiz saw three crevasses formed in an hour and a half, and heard oth- ers opening at a greater distance from him. He counted eight new fissures in a space of one hundred and twenty-five feet. The phe- nomenon continued throughout the evening, and recurred, though with less frequency, dur- ing the night. The cracks were narrow, the largest an inch and a half in width, and their great depth was proved by the rapidity with which they drained any standing water in their immediate vicinity. "A boring-hole/' says Agassiz, " one hundred and thirty feet deep and six inches in diameter, full of water, was completely emptied in a few minutes, showing that these narrow cracks penetrated to great depths." The summer's work included observations also on the comparative movement of the gla- cier during the day and night, on the surface waste of the mass, its reparation, on the neVe and snow of the upper regions, on the merid- ian holes, the sun-dials of the glaciers, as they 1 Extract from a letter of Louis Agassiz to M. Arago dated from the H6tel des Neuchatelois, Glacier of the Aar, August 7,1842. CONTEMPLATES GOING TO AMERICA. 355 have been called.1 On the whole, the most important result of the campaign was the topographical survey of the glacier, recorded in the map published in Agassiz's second work on the glacier. At about this time there begin to be occa- sional references in his correspondence to a journey of exploration in the United States. Especially was this plan in frequent discus- sion between him and Charles Bonaparte, Prince of Canino, a naturalist almost as ardent as himself, with whom he had long been in intimate scientific correspondence. In April, 1842, the prince writes him : " I indulge my- self in dreaming of the journey to America in which you have promised to accompany me. 1 " Here and there on the glacier there are patches of loose material, dust, sand, or gravel, accumulated by diminutive water-rills and small enough to become heated during the day. They will, of course, be warmed first on their eastern side, then still more powerfully on their southern side, and, in the afternoon, with less force again, on their western side, while the northern side will remain comparatively cool. Thus around more than half of their circumference they melt the ice in a semicircle, and the glacier is covered with little crescent-shaped troughs of this description, with a steep wall on one side and a shallow one on the other, and a little heap of loose materials in the bottom. They are the sun-dials of the glacier, recording the hour by the advance of the sun's rays upon them." — Geological Sketches, by L. Agassiz, p. 293. 356 LOUIS AGASSIZ. What a relaxation ! and at the same time what an amount of useful work ! " Again, a few months later, " You must keep me well advised of your plans, and I, in my turn, will try so to arrange my affairs as to find my- self free in the spring of 1844 for a voyage, the chief object of which will be to show my oldest son the country where he was born, and where man may develop free of shackles. The mere anticipation of this journey is de- lightful to me, since I shall have you at my side, and may thus feel sure that it will make an epoch in science." This letter is answered from the glacier ; the first part refers to the Nomenclator, in regard to which he often con- sulted the prince. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO THE PRINCE OF CANTNO. GLACIER OF THE AAR, September 1, 1842. ... I thank you most sincerely for the pains you have so kindly taken with my proof, and for pointing out the faults and omissions you have noticed in my register of birds. I made the corrections at once, and have taken the liberty of mentioning on the cover of this number the share you have consented to take in my Nomenclator. I shall try to do better and better in the successive classes, but you AGASSIZ TO THE PRINCE OF CANINO. 357 well know the impossibility of avoiding1 grave errors in such a work, and that they can be wholly weeded out only in a second and third edition. I should have written sooner in an- swer to your last, had not your letter reached me on the Glacier of the Aar, where I have been since the beginning of July, following up observations, the results of which become every day more important and more convincing. The most striking fact, one which I think I have placed beyond the reach of doubt, is the primitive stratification of the neve, or fields of snow, — stratified from the higher regions across the whole course of the glacier to its lower extremity. I have prepared a general map, with transverse sections, showing how the layers lift themselves on the borders of the glacier and also at their junction, where two glaciers meet at the outlet of adjoining valleys ; and how, also, the waving lines formed by the layers on the surface change to sharper concentric curves with a marked axis, as the glacier descends to lower levels. For a full demonstration of the matter, I ought to send you my map and plans, of which I have, as yet, no duplicates ; but the fact is incontest- able, and you will oblige me by announcing it in the geological section at Padua. M. 358 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Charpentier, who is going to your meeting, will contest it, but you can tell him from me that it is as evident as the stratification of the Nep tunic rocks. To see and understand it fully, however, one must stand well above the glacier, so as to command the surface as a whole in one view. I would add that I am not now alluding to the blue and white bands in the ice of which I spoke to you last year ; this is a quite distinct phenomenon. I wish I could accept your kind invitation, but until I have gone to the bottom of the glacier question and terminated my " Fossil Fishes," I do not venture to move. It is no light task to finish all this before our long journey, to which I look forward, as it draws nearer, with a constantly increasing interest. I am very sorry not to join you at Florence. It would have been a great pleasure for me to visit the collections of northern Italy in your company. ... I write you on a snowy day, which keeps me a prisoner in my tent ; it is so cold that I can hardly hold my pen, and the water froze at my bedside last night. The greatest privation is, however, the lack of fruit and vegetables. Hardly a potato once a fortnight, but always and every day, morn- ing and night, mutton, everlasting mutton, FOSSIL FISHES AGAIN. 359 and rice soup. As early as the end of July we were caught for three days by the snow ; I fear I shall be forced to break up our encamp- ment next week without having finished my work. What a contrast between this life and that of the plain ! I am afraid my letter may be long on the road before reaching the mail, and I pause here that I may not miss the chance of forwarding it by a man who has just arrived with provisions and is about to return to the hospice of the Grimsel, where some trustworthy guide will undertake to de- liver it at the first post-office. No sooner is Agassiz returned from the glacier than we meet him again in the do- main of his fossil fishes. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIB PHILIP EGERTON. NEUCHATEL, December 15, 1842. ... In the last few months I have made an important step in the identification of fos- sil fishes. The happy idea occurred to me of applying the microscope to the study of frag- ments of their bones, especially those of the head, and I have found in their structure modifications as remarkable and as numerous as those which Mr. Owen discovered in the 360 LOUIS AGASSIZ. structure of teeth. Here there is a vast new field to explore. I have already applied it to the identification of the fossil fishes in the Old Red of Russia sent me for that purpose by Mr. Murchison. You will find more ample details about it in my report to him. I con- gratulate myself doubly on the results ; first, because of their great importance in paleon- tology, and also because they will draw more closely my relations with Mr. Owen, whom I always rejoice to meet on the same path with myself, and whom I believe incapable of jeal- ousy in such matters. . . . The only point indeed, on which I think I may have a little friendly difference with him, is concerning the genus Labyrinthodon, which I am firmly re- solved, on proofs that seem to me conclusive, to claim for the class of fishes.1 As soon as I have time I will write to Mr. Owen, but this need not prevent you from speaking to him on the subject if you have an early opportunity to do so. I am now exclusively occupied with the fossil fishes, which at any cost I wish to finish this winter. . . . Before even returning to my glacier work, I will finish my monograph of the Old Red, so that you may present it at 1 On seeing Owen's evidence some years later, Agassiz at once acknowledged himself mistaken on this point. VARIOUS PUBLICATIONS COMPLETED. 361 the Cork meeting, which it will be impossible for me to attend. ... I am infinitely grate- ful to you and Lord Enniskillen for your will- ingness to trust your Sheppy fishes to me ; I shall thus be prepared in advance for a strict determination of these fossils. Having them for some time before my eyes, I shall be- come familiar with all the details. When I know them thoroughly, and have compared them with the collections of skeletons in the Museums of Paris, of Leyden, of Berlin, and of Halle, I will then come to England to see what there may be in other collections which I cannot have at my disposal here. The winter of 1843, apart from his duties as professor, was devoted to the completion of the various zoological works on which he was engaged, and to the revision of materials he had brought back from the glacier. His hab- its with reference to physical exercise were very irregular. He passed at once from the life of the mountaineer to that of the closet student. After weeks spent on the snow and ice of the glacier, constantly on foot and in the open air, he would shut himself up for a still longer time in his laboratory, motionless for hours at his microscope by day, and writ- 362 LOUIS AGASS1Z. ing far into the night, rarely leaving his work till long after midnight. He was also forced at this time to press forward his pub- lications in the hope that he might have some return for the sums he had expended upon them. This was indeed a very anxious pe- riod of his life. He could never be brought to believe that purely intellectual aims were not also financially sound, and his lithographic establishment, his glacier work, and his costly researches in zoology had proved far beyond his means. The prophecies of his old friend Humboldt were coming true. He was entan- gled in obligations, and crushed under the weight of his own undertakings. He began to doubt the possibility of carrying out his plan of a scientific journey to the United States. AGASSIZ TO THE PRINCE OF CANINO. NEUCHATEL, April, 1843. ... I have worked like a slave all winter to finish my fossil fishes ; you will presently receive my fifteenth and sixteenth numbers, forwarded two days since, with more than forty pages of text, containing many new ob- servations. I shall allow myself no interrup- tion until this work is finished, hoping there- AMERICAN JOURNEY IMPOSSIBLE. 363 by to obtain a little freedom, for if my posi- tion here is not changed I shall be forced to seek the means of existence elsewhere. Mean- time, extravagant projects present themselves, as is apt to be the case when one is in diffi- culties. That of accompanying you to the United States was so tempting, that I am bit- terly disappointed to think that its execution becomes impossible in my present circum- stances. All my projects for further publi- cations must also be adjourned, or perhaps renounced. . . . Possibly, when my work on the fossil fishes is completed, the sale of some additional copies may help me to rise again. And yet I have not much hope of this, since all the attempts of my friends to obtain sub- scriptions for me in France and Russia have failed : because the French government takes no interest in what is done out of Paris ; and in Russia such researches, having little direct utility, are looked upon with indifference. Do you think any position would be open to me in the United States, where I might earn enough to enable me to continue the publica- tion of my unhappy books, which never pay their way because they do not meet the wants of the world ? . 364 LOUIS AGASSIZ. In the following July we find him again upon the glacier. But the campaign of 1843 opened sadly for the glacial party. Arriving at Meiringen they heard that Jacob Leuthold was ill and would probably be unable to ac- company them. They went to his house, and found him, indeed, the ghost of his former self, apparently in a rapid decline. Neverthe- less, he welcomed them gladly to his humble home, and would have kept them for some re- freshment. Fearing to fatigue him, however, they stayed but a few moments. As they left, one of the party pointed to the moun- tains, adding a hope that he might soon join them. His eyes filled with tears ; it was his only answer, and he died three days later. He was but thirty-seven years of age, and at that time the most intrepid and the most intelli- gent of the Oberland guides. His death was felt as a personal grief by the band of work- ers whose steps he had for years guided over the most difficult Alpine passes. The summer's work continued and com- pleted that of the last season. On leaving the glacier the year before they had marked a net-work of loose boulders, such as travel with the ice, and also a number of fixed points in the valley walls, comparing and registering GLACIAL WORK FOR 1842. 365 their distance from each other. They had also sunk a line of stakes across the glacier. The change in the relative position of the two sets of signals and the curve in their line of stakes gave them, self-recorded, as it were, the rate of advance of the glacier as a whole, and also the comparative rate of progression in its different parts. Great pains was also taken during the summer to measure the ad- vance in every twenty-four hours, as well as to compare the diurnal with the nocturnal movement, and to ascertain the amount of surface waste. The season was an unfavor- able one, beginning so late and continuing so cold that the period of work was shortened. CHAPTER XII. 1843-1846: JET. 36-39. Completion of Fossil Fishes. — Followed by Fossil Fishes of the Old Red Sandstone. — Review of the Later Work. — Identification of Fishes by the Skull. — Renewed Corre- spondence with Prince Canino about Journey to the United States. — Change of Plan owing to the Interest of the King of Prussia in the Expedition. — Correspondence be- tween Professor Sedgwick and Agassiz on Development Theory.— Final Scientific Work in Neuchatel and Paris. — Publication of "Systeme Glaciaire." — Short Stay in England. — Sails for United States. IN 1843 the " Recherches sur les Poissons Fossiles " was completed, and fast upon its foot- steps, in 1844, followed the author's "Mon- ograph on the Fossil Fishes of the Old Red Sandstone, or the Devonian System of Great Britain and Russia," a large quarto volume of text, accompanied by forty-one plates. Noth- ing in his paleontological studies ever inter- ested Agassiz more than this curious fauna of the Old Red, so strange in its combinations that even well-informed naturalists had attrib- uted its fossil remains to various classes of the animal kingdom in turn, and, indeed, long FISHES OF OLD RED SANDSTONE. 367 remained in doubt as to their true nature. Agassiz says himself in his Preface : " I can never forget the impression produced upon me by the sight of these creatures, furnished with appendages resembling wings, yet belonging, as I had satisfied myself, to the class of fishes. Here was a type entirely new to us, about to reenter (for the first time since it had ceased to exist) the series of beings ; nor could any- thing, thus far revealed from extinct creations, have led us to anticipate its existence. So true is it that observation alone is a safe guide to the laws of development of organized be- ings, and that we must be on our guard against all those systems of transformation of species so lightly invented by the imagination." The author goes on to state that the discov- ery of these fossils was mainly due to Hugh Miller, and that his own work had been con- fined to the identification of their character and the determination of their relations to the already known fossil fishes. This work, upon a type so extraordinary, implied, however, in- numerable and reiterated comparisons, and a minute study of the least fragments of the re- mains which could be procured. The materials were chiefly obtained in Scotland ; but Sir Koderick Murchison also contributed his own 368 LOUIS AGASSIZ. collection from the Old Red of Russia, and various other specimens from the same local- ity. Not only on account of their peculiar structure were the fishes of the Old Red in- teresting to Agassiz, but also because, with this fauna, the vertebrate type took its place for the first time in what were then supposed to be the most ancient fossiliferous beds. When Agassiz first began his researches on fossil fishes, no vertebrate form had been dis- covered below the coal. The occurrence of fishes in the Devonian and Silurian beds threw the vertebrate type back, as he believed, into line with all the invertebrate classes, and seemed to him to show that the four great types of the animal kingdom, Radiates, Mol- lusks, Articulates, and Vertebrates, had ap- peared together.1 "It is henceforth demon- strated," says Agassiz, "that the fishes were included in the plan of the first organic com- binations which made the point of departure for all the living inhabitants of our globe in the series of time." In his opinion this simultaneity of appear- ance, as well as the richness and variety dis- played by invertebrate classes from the begin- 1 Introduction to the Poissons Fossiles du Vieux Ores Rouget p. 22. LIVING AND FOSSIL FISHES. 369 ning, made it l " impossible to refer the first inhabitants of the earth to a few stocks, sub- sequently differentiated under the influence of external conditions of existence." . . . He adds : 2 " I have elsewhere presented my views upon the development through which the suc- cessive creations have passed during the his- tory of our planet. But what I wish to prove here, by a careful discussion of the facts re- ported in the following pages, is the truth of the law now so clearly demonstrated in the series of vertebrates, that the successive crea- tions have undergone phases of development analogous to those of the embryo in its growth and similar to the gradations shown by the present creation in the ascending series, which it presents as a whole. One may consider it as henceforth proved that the embryo of the fish during its development, the class of fishes as it at present exists in its numerous families, and the type of fish in its planetary history, exhibit analogous phases through which one may follow the same creative thought like a guiding thread in the study of the connection 1 Introduction to the Poissons Fossiles du Vieux Ores Rouge, p. 21. 2 Introduction to the Poissons Fossiles du Vieux Gres Rouge, p. 24. VOL L 24 370 LOUIS AGASSIZ. between organized beings." Following this comparison closely, lie shows how the early embryonic condition of the present fishes is recalled by the general disposition of the fins in the fishes of the Old Red Sandstone, and especially by the caudal fin, making the un- evenly lobed tail, so characteristic of these ancient forms. This so called heterocercal tail is only known to exist, as a permanent adult feature, in the sturgeons of to-day. The form of the head and the position of the mouth and eyes in the fishes of the Old Red were also shown to be analogous with embry- onic phases of our present fishes. From these analogies, and also from the ascendency of fishes as the only known vertebrate, and there- fore as the highest type in those ancient de- posits, Agassiz considered this fauna as repre- senting " the embryonic age of the reign of fishes ; " and he sums up his results in conclu- sion in the following words : " The facts, taken as a whole, seem to me to show, not only that the fishes of the Old Red constitute an inde- pendent fauna, distinct from those of other deposits, but that they also represent in their organization the most remarkable analogy with the first phases of embryonic development in the bony fishes of our epoch, and a no less VIEWS OF AGASSIZ ON EVOLUTION. 371 marked parallelism with the lower degrees of certain types of the class as it now exists on the surface of the earth." It has been said by one of the biographers of Agassiz,1 in reference to this work upon the fishes of the Old Red Sandstone : " It is dif- ficult to understand why the results of these admirable researches, and of later ones made by him, did not in themselves lead him to sup- port the theory of transformation, of which they seem the natural consequence." It is true that except for the frequent allusion to a creative thought or plan, this introduction to the Fishes of the Old Red might seem to be written by an advocate of the development theory rather than by its most determined opponent, so much does it deal with laws of the organic world, now used in support of evolution. These comprehensive laws, an- nounced by Agassiz in his " Poissons Fos- siles," and afterward constantly reiterated by him, have indeed been adopted by the writers on evolution, though with a wholly different interpretation. No one saw more clearly than Agassiz the relation which he first pointed out, between the succession of animals of the same type in time and the phases of their em- 1 Louis Agassiz : Notice biographique, par Ernest Favre. 372 LOUIS AGASSIZ. bryonic growth to-day, and he often said, in his lectures, " the history of the individual is the history of the type." But the coincidence between the geological succession, the embry- onic development, the zoological gradation, and the geographical distribution of animals in the past and the present, rested, according to his belief, upon an intellectual coherence and not upon a material connection. So, also, the variability, as well as the constancy, of organized beings, at once so plastic and so inflexible, seemed to him controlled by some- thing more than the mechanism of self-adjust- ing forces. In this conviction he remained unshaken all his life, although the develop- ment theory came up for discussion under so many various aspects during that time. His views are now in the descending scale ; but to give them less than their real prominence here would be to deprive his scientific career of its true basis. Belief in a Creator was the key- note of his study of nature. In summing up the comprehensive results of Agassiz's paleontological researches, and especially of his " Fossil Fishes/' Arnold Guyot says : 1 — " Whatever be the opinions which many 1 See Biographical Memoir of Louis Agafsiz, p. 28. AGASSI Z ON PALEONTOLOGY. 373 may entertain as to the interpretation of some of these generalizations, the vast importance of these results of Agassiz's studies may be appreciated by the incontestable fact, that nearly all the questions which modern pale- ontology has treated are here raised and in great measure solved. They already form a code of general laws which has become a foundation for the geological history of the life-system, and which the subsequent investi- gations of science have only modified and ex- tended, not destroyed. Nowhere did the mind of Agassiz show more power of generalization, more vigor, or more originality. The discov- ery of these great truths is truly his work ; he derived them immediately from nature by his own observations. Hence it is that all his later zoological investigations tend to a com- mon aim, namely, to give by farther studies, equally conscientious but more extensive, a broader and more solid basis to those laws which he had read in nature and which he had proclaimed at that early date in his im- mortal work, ' Poissons Fossiles.' Let us not be astonished that he should have remained faithful to these views to the end of his life. It is because he had seen that he believed, and such a faith is not easily shaken by new hypotheses." 374 LOUIS AGASSIZ. LOUIS AGASSIZ TO SIB PHILIP EGERTON. NEUCHATEL, September 7, 1844. ... I write in all haste to ask for any ad- dress to which I can safely forward my report on the Sheppy fishes, so that they may arrive without fail in time for the meeting at York. Since my last letter I have made progress in this kind of research. I have sacrificed all my duplicates of our present fishes to furnish skeletons. I have prepared more than a hun- dred since I last wrote you, and I can now determine the family, and even the genus, sim- ply by seeing the skull. There remains noth- ing impossible now in the determination of fishes, and if I can obtain certain exotic gen- era, which I have not as yet, I can make an osteology of fishes as complete as that which we possess for the other classes of vertebrates. Every family has its special type of skull. All this is extremely interesting. I have al- ready corrected a mass of inaccurate identifi- cations established upon external characters ; and as for fossils, I have recognized and char- acterized seventeen new genera among the less perfect undetermined specimens you have sent me. Several families appear now for the first time among the fossils. I have been able to FOSSIL FISHES OF SHEPPY. 375 determine to what family all the doubtful genera belong ; indeed Sheppy will prove as rich in species as Mont Bolca. When you see your specimens again you will hardly recognize them, they are so changed ; I have chiseled and cleaned them, until they are al- most like anatomical preparations. Try to procure as many more specimens as possible and send them to me. I cannot stir from Neuchatel, now that I am so fully in the spirit of work, and besides it would be a use- less expense. . . . You will receive with my report the three numbers which complete my monograph of the Fishes of the Old Red. I feel sure, in advance, that you will be satis- fied with them. . . . SIB PHILIP EGERTON TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. TOLLY HOUSE, ALNESS, ROSS-SHIRE. ") September 15, 1844. ) ... I have only this day received your letter of the 6th, and I fear much you will scarcely receive this in time to make it avail- able. I shall not be able to reach York for the commencement of the meeting, but hope to be there on Saturday, September 28th. A parcel will reach me in the shortest possible time addressed Sir P. Egerton, Donnington 376 LOUIS AGASSIZ. Kectory, York. I am delighted with the bright results of your comparison of the Sheppy fossils with recent forms. You ap- pear to have opened out an entirely new field of investigation, likely to be productive of most brilliant results. Should any acci- dent delay the arrival of your monograph for the York meeting, I shall make a point of communicating to our scientific friends the contents of your letter, as I know they will rejoice to hear of the progress of fossil ich- thyology in your masterly hands. When next you come, I wish you could spend a few days here. We are surrounded on all sides by the debris of the moraines of the ancient glaciers that descended the flank of Ben Wyvis, and I think you would find much to interest you in tracing their relations. We have also the Cromarty Fish-beds within a few miles, and many other objects of geolog- ical interest. ... I shall see Lord Enniskillen at York, and will tell him of your success. We shall, of course, procure all the Sheppy fish we can either by purchase or exchange. . . . The pressure of work upon his various pub- lications detained Agassiz at home during the summer of 1844. For the first tune he was RENEWED PLANS FOR UNITED STATES. 377 unable to make one of the glacial party this year, but the work was carried on uninterrupt- edly, and the results reported to him. Mean- time his contemplated journey to the United States flitted constantly before him. AGASSIZ TO THE PRINCE OF CANINO. NEUCHATEL, November 19, 1844. . . . Your idea of an illustrated American ichthyology is admirable. But for that we ought to have with us an artist clever enough to paint fishes rapidly from the life. Work but half done is no longer permissible in our days. ... In this matter I think there is a justice due to Rafinesque. However poor his descriptions, he nevertheless first rec- ognized the necessity of multiplying genera in ichthyology, and that at a time when the thing was far more difficult than now. Sev- eral of his genera have even the priority over those now accepted, and I think in the United States it would be easier than elsewhere to find again a part of the materials on which he worked. We must not neglect from this time forth to ask Americans to put us in the way of extending this work throughout North America. If you accept me for your collabo- rator, I will at once do all that I can on my 378 LOUIS AGASSIZ. side to bring together notes and specimens. I will write to several naturalists in the United States, and tell them that as I am to accom- pany you on your voyage I should be glad to know in advance what they have done in ich- thyology, so that we may be the better pre- pared to profit by our short sojourn in their country. However, I will do nothing before having your directions, which, for the sake of the matter in hand, I should be glad to re- ceive as early as possible. . . . The next letter announces a new aspect of the projected journey. In explanation, it should be said that finding Agassiz might be prevented by his poverty from going, the prince had invited him to be his guest for a summer in the United States. AGASSIZ TO THE PRINCE OF CANINO. NEUCHATEL, January 7, 1845. ... I have received an excellent piece of news from Humboldt, which I hasten to share with you. I venture to believe that it will please you also. ... I had written to Hum- boldt of our plans, and of your kind offer to take me with you to the United States, tell- ing him at the same time how much I regret- CHANGE OF PLANS FOR UNITED STATES. 379 ted that I should be unable to visit the regions which attracted me the most from a geolog- ical point of view, and asking him if it would be possible to interest the king in this jour- ney and obtain means from his majesty for a longer stay on the other side of the Atlantic. I have just received a delightful and most unexpected reply. The king will grant me 15,000 francs for this object, so that I shall, in any event, be able to make the journey. All the more do I desire to make it in your society, and I think by combining our forces we shall obtain more important results ; but I am glad that I can do it without being a bur- den to you. Before answering Humboldt, I am anxious to know whether your plans are definitely decided upon for this summer, and whether this arrangement suits you. . . . The pleasant plan so long meditated was not to be fulfilled. The prince was obliged to defer the journey and never accomplished it. This was a great disappointment to Agas- siz. " Am I then to go without you," he writes ; " is this irrevocable ? If I were to defer my departure till September would it then be pos- sible for you to leave Rome ? It would be 380 LOUIS AGASSIZ. too delightful if we could make this journey together. I wish also, before starting, to re- view everything that has been done of late in paleontology, zoology, and comparative anat- omy, that I may, in behalf of all these sciences, take advantage of the circumstances in which I shall be placed. . . . Whatever befalls me, I feel that I shall never cease to consecrate my whole energy to the study of nature ; its all powerful charm has taken such possession of me that I shall always sacrifice everything to it ; even the things which men usually value most." Agassiz had determined, before starting on his journey, to complete all his unfinished works, and to put in order his correspondence and collections, including1 the vast amount of f O specimens sent him for identification or for his own researches. The task of " setting his house in order " for a change which, perhaps, he dimly felt to be more momentous than it seemed, proved long and laborious. From all accounts, he performed prodigies of work, but the winter and spring passed, and the summer of 1845 found him still at his post. Humboldt writes him not without anxiety lest his determination to complete all the tasks he had undertaken, including the Nomenclator, LETTER FROM HUMBOLDT. 381 should involve him in endless delays and per- plexities. HUMBOLDT TO AGASSIZ. BERLIN, September 16, 1845. . . . Your Nomenclator frightens me with its double entries. The Milky Way must have crossed your path, for you seem to be dealing with nebulae which you are trying to resolve into stars. For pity's sake husband your strength. You treat this journey as if it were for life. As to finishing, — alas ! my friend, one does not finish. Considering all that you have in your well-furnished brain beside your accumulated papers, half the con- tents of which you do not yourself know, your expression " aufraumen," — to put in final order, is singularly inappropriate. There will always remain some burdensome residue, — last things not yet accounted for. I beg you, then, not to abuse your strength. Be content to finish only what seems to you near- est completion, — the most advanced of your work. Your letter reached me, unaccompanied, however, by the books it announces. They are to come, no doubt, in some other way. Spite of the demands made upon me by the continuation of my " Cosmos," I shall find 382 LOUIS AGASSIZ. time to read and profit by your introduction to the Old Red. I am inclined to sing hymns of praise to the Hyperboreans who have helped you in this admirable work. What you say of the specific difference in vertical line and of the increased number of biological epochs is full of interest and wisdom. No wonder you rebel against the idea that the Baltic con- tains microscopic animals identical with those of the chalk ! I foresee, however, a new battle of Waterloo between you and my friend Eh- renberg, who accompanied me lately, just after the Victoria festivals, to the volcanoes of the Eifel with Dechen. Not an inch of ground without infusoria in those regions ! For Heav- en's sake do not meddle with the infusoria before you have seen the Canada Lakes and completed your journey. Defer them till some more tranquil period of your life. . . . I must close my letter with the hope that you will never doubt my warm affection. Assur- edly I shall find no fault with any course of lectures you may give in the new world, nor do I see the least objection to giving them for money. You can thus propagate your favor- ite views and spread useful knowledge, while at the same time you will, by most honorable and praiseworthy means, provide additional funds for your traveling expenses. . . . LETTER FROM PROFESSOR SEDGWICK. 383 The following correspondence with Profes- sor Adam Sedgwick is of interest, as showing his attitude and that of Agassiz toward ques- tions which have since acquired a still greater scientific importance. PROFESSOR ADAM SEDGWICK TO LOUIS AGASSIZ. TRINITY COLL., CAMBRIDGE, > April 10, 1845. > MY DEAR PROFESSOR, — The British Asso- ciation is to meet here about the middle of June, and I trust that the occasion will again bring you to England and give me the great happiness of entertaining you in Trinity Col- lege. Indeed, I wish very much to see you ; for many years have now elapsed since I last had that pleasure. May God long preserve your life, which has been spent in promoting the great ends of truth and knowledge ! Your great work on fossil fishes is now before me, and I also possess the first number of your monograph upon the fishes of the Old Red Sandstone. I trust the new numbers will fol- low the first in rapid succession. I love now and then to find a resting - place ; and your works always give me one. The opinions of Geoffroy St. Hilaire and his dark school seem to be gaining some ground in England. I 384 LOUIS AGASS1Z. detest them, because I think them untrue. They shut out all argument from design and all notion of a Creative Providence, and in so doing they appear to me to deprive physiology of its life and strength, and language of its beauty and meaning. I am as much offended in taste by the turgid mystical bombast of Geoffroy as I am disgusted by his cold and irrational materialism. When men of his school talk of the elective affinity of organic types, I hear a jargon I cannot comprehend, and I turn from it in disgust ; and when they talk of spontaneous generation and transmuta- tion of species, they seem to me to try nature by an hypothesis, and not to try their hypoth- esis by nature. Where are their facts on which to form an inductive truth ? I deny their starting condition. " Oh ! but " they re- ply, " we have progressive development in ge- ology." Now, I allow (as all geologists must do) a 'kind of progressive development. For example, the first fish are below the reptiles ; and the first reptiles older than man. I say, we have -successive forms of animal life adapted to successive conditions (so far, prov- ing design), and not derived in natural suc- cession in the ordinary way of generation. But if no single fact in actual nature allows LETTER FROM PROFESSOR SEDGWICK. 385 us to suppose that the new species and orders were produced successively in the natural way, how did they begin ? I reply, by a way out of and above common known, material nature, and this way I call creation. Generation and creation are two distinct ideas, and must be described by two distinct words, unless we wish to introduce utter confusion of thought and language. In this view I think you agree with me ; for I spoke to you on the subject when we met (alas, ten years since !) at Dub- lin. Would you have the great kindness to give me your most valuable opinion on one or two points ? (1.) Is it possible, according to the known laws of actual nature, or is it probable, on any analogies of nature, that the vast series of fish, from those of the Ludlow rock and the Old Red Sandstone to those of our ac- tual seas, lakes, and rivers, are derived from one common original -low type, in the way of development and by propagation or natural breeding ? I should say, no. But my knowl- edge is feeble and at second-hand. Yours is strong and from the fountain-head. (2.) Is the organic type of fish higher now than it was during the carboniferous period, when the Sauroids so much abounded? If VOL. I. 25 386 LOUIS AGASSIZ. the progressive theory of Geoffroy be true, in his sense, each class of animals ought to be progressive in its organic type. It appears to me that this is not true. Pray tell me your own views on this point. (3.) There are " odd fish " (as we say in jest) in the Old Red Sandstone. Do these so graduate into crustaceans as to form anything like such an organic link that one could, by generation, come naturally from the other ? I should say, no, being instructed by your labors. Again, allowing this, for the sake of argument, are there not much higher types of fish which are contemporaneous with the lower types (if, indeed, they be lower), and do not these nobler fish of the Old Red Sandstone stultify the hypothesis of natural generative development ? (4.) Will you give me, in a few general words, your views of the scale occupied by the fish of the Old Red, considered as a nat- ural group ? Are they so rudimentary as to look like abortions or creatures derived from some inferior class, which have not yet by de- velopment reached the higher type of fish ? Again, I should say, no ; but I long for an answer from a great authority like yours. I am most anxious for a good general concep- LETTER TO PROFESSOR SEDGWICK. 387 tion of the fish of the Old Red, with reference to some intelligible scale. (5.) Lastly, is there the shadow of ground for supposing that by any natural generative development the Ichthyosaurians and other kindred forms of reptile have come from Sau- roid, or any other type of fish? I believe you will say, no. At any rate, the facts of geology lend no support to such a view, for the nobler forms of Reptile appear in strata below those in which the Ichthyosaurians, etc., are first seen. But I must not trouble you with more questions. Professor Whewell is now Master of Trinity College. We shall all rejoice to see you. Ever, my dear Professor, your most faithful and most grateful friend, A. SEDGWICK. FROM LOUIS AGASSIZ TO A. SEDGWICK. NEUCHATEL, June, 1845. ... I reproach myself for not acknowledg- ing at once your most interesting letter of April 10th. But you will easily understand that in the midst of the rush of work conse- quent upon my preparation for a journey of several years' duration I have not noticed the flight of time since I received it, until to-day, 388 LOUIS AGASSI Z. when the sight of the date fills me with con- fusion. And yet, for years, I have not re- ceived a letter which has given me greater pleasure or moved me more deeply. I have felt in it and have received from it that vigor of conviction which gives to all you say or write a virile energy, captivating alike to the listener or the reader. Like you, I am pained by the progress of certain tendencies in the domain of the natural sciences ; it is not only the arid character of this philosophy of nature (and by this I mean, not natural philosophy, but the " Natur-philosophie " of the Germans and French) which alarms me. I dread quite as much the exaggeration of religious fanati- cism, borrowing fragments from science, im- perfectly or not at all understood, and then making use of them to prescribe to scientific men what they are allowed to see or to find in Nature. Between these two extremes it is difficult to follow a safe road. The reason is, perhaps, that the domain of facts has not yet received a sufficiently general recognition, while traditional beliefs still have too much influence upon the study of the sciences. Wishing to review such ideas as I had formed upon these questions, I gave a public course this winter upon the plan of creation PLAN IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM. 389 as shown in the development of the animal kingdom. I wish I could send it to you, for I think it might please you. Unhappily, I had no time to write it out, and have not even an outline of it. But I intend to work fur- ther upon this subject and make a book upon it one of these days. If I speak of it to-day it is because in this course I have treated all the questions upon which you ask my opinion. Let me answer them here after a somewhat aphoristic fashion. I find it impossible to attribute the biolog- ical phenomena, which have been and still are going on upon the surface of our globe, to the simple action of physical forces. I believe they are due, in their entirety, as well as in- dividually, to the direct intervention of a crea- tive power, acting freely and in an autonomic way. ... I have tried to make this intentional plan in the organization of the animal king- dom evident, by showing that the differences between animals do not constitute a material chain, analogous to a series of physical phe- nomena, bound together by the same law, but present themselves rather as the phases of a thought, formulated according to a definite aim. I think we know enough of compara- tive anatomy to abandon forever the idea of 390 LOUIS AGASSI Z. the transformation of the organs of one type into those of another. The metamorphoses of certain animals, and especially of insects, so often cited in support of this idea, prove, by the fixity with which they repeat themselves in innumerable species, exactly the contrary. In the persistency of these metamorphoses, distinct for each species and known to repeat themselves annually in a hundred thousand species, and to have done so ever since the present order of things was established on the earth, have we not the most direct proof that the diversity of types is not due to external natural influences ? I have followed this idea in all the types of the animal kingdom. I have also tried to show the direct intervention of a creative power in the geographical dis- tribution of organized beings on the surface of the globe when the species are definitely circumscribed. As evidence of the fixity of generic types and the existence of a higher and free causal power, I have made use of a method which appears to me new as a process of reasoning. The series of reptiles, for in- stance, in the family of lizards, shows apodal forms, forms with rudimentary feet, then with a successively larger number of fingers until we reach, by seemingly insensible gradations, DISTINCT SPECIES. 391 the genera Anguis, Ophisaurus, and Pseudo- pus, the Chamosauria, Chirotes, Bipes, Sepo, Scincus, and at last the true lizards. It would seem to any reasonable man that these types are the transformations of a single primitive type, so closely do the modifications approach each other; and yet I now reject any such supposition, and after having studied the facts most thoroughly, I find in them a direct proof of the creation of all these species. It must not be forgotten that the genus Anguis be- longs to Europe, the Ophisaurus to North America, the Pseudopus to Dalmatia and the Caspian steppe, the Sepo to Italy, etc. Now, I ask how portions of the earth so absolutely distinct could have combined to form a con- tinuous zoological series, now so strikingly dis- tributed, and whether the idea of this develop- ment could have started from any other source than a creative purpose manifested in space ? These same purposes, this same constancy in the employment of means toward a final end, may be read still more clearly in the study of the fossils of the different creations. The species of all the creations are materially and genealogically as distinct from each other as those of the different points on the surface of the globe. I have compared hundreds of spe- 392 LOUIS AGASSIZ. cies reputed identical in various successive de- posits,— species which are always quoted in favor of a transition, however indirect, from one group of species to another, — and I have always found marked specific differences be- tween them. In a few weeks I will send you a paper which I have just printed on this sub- ject, where it seems to me this view is very satisfactorily proved. The idea of a procrea- tion of new species by preceding ones is a gra- tuitous supposition opposed to all sound phys- iological notions. And yet it is true that, taken as a whole, there is a gradation in the organized beings of successive geological for- mations, and that the end and aim of this development is the appearance of man. But this serial connection of all successive creat- ures is not material ; taken singly these groups of species show no relation through interme- diate forms genetically derived one from the other. The connection between them becomes evident only when they are considered as a whole emanating from a creative power, the author of them all. To your special questions I may now very briefly reply. Have fishes descended from a primitive type? So far am I from thinking this pos- sible, that I do not believe there is a single SUCCESSION OF FISHES. 393 specimen of fossil or living fish, whether ma- rine or fresh-water, that has not been created with reference to a special intention and a definite aim, even though we may be able to detect but a portion of these numerous rela- tions and of the essential purpose. Are the present fishes superior to the older ones ? As a general proposition, I would say, no ; it seems to me even that the fishes which preceded the appearance of reptiles in the plan of creation were higher in certain char- acters than those which succeeded them ; and it is a strange fact that these ancient fishes have something analogous with reptiles, which had not then made their appearance. One would say that they already existed in the creative thought, and that their coming, not far removed, was actually anticipated. Can the fishes of the Old Red be considered the embryos of those of later epochs? Of course they are the first types of the verte- brate series, including the most ancient of the Silurian system ; but they each constitute an independent fauna, as numerous in the places where these earlier fishes are found, as the present fishes in any area of similar extent on our sea-shore to-day. I now know one hundred and four species of fossil fish from 394 LOUIS AGASSIZ. the Old Red, belonging to forty-four genera, comprised under seven families, between sev- eral of which there is but little analogy as to organization. It is therefore impossible to look upon them as coming from one primitive stock. The primitive diversity of these types is quite as remarkable as that of those be- longing to later epochs. It is nevertheless true that, regarded as part of the general plan of creation, this fauna presents itself as an inferior type of the vertebrate series, con- necting itself directly in the creative thought with the realization of later forms, the last of which (and this seems to me to have been the general end of creation) was to place man at the head of organized beings as the key-stone and term of the whole series, the final point in the premeditated intention of the primitive plan which has been carried out progressively in the course of time. I would even say that I believe the creation of man has closed creation on this earth, and I draw this conclusion from the fact that the human genus is the first cosmopolite type in Nature. One may even affirm that man is clearly announced in the phases of organic development of the animal kingdom as the final term of this series. Lastly : Is there any reason to believe that POPULAR LECTURES IN NEUCHATEL. 395 the Ichthyosaurians are descendants of the Sauroid fishes which preceded the appearance of these reptiles? Not the least. I should consider any naturalist who would seriously present the question in this light as incapable of discussing it or judging it. He would place himself outside of the facts and would reason from a basis of his own creating. . . . In the " Revue Suisse " of .April, 1845, there is a notice of the course of lectures to which reference is made in the above letter. " A numerous audience assembled on the 26th of March for the opening of a course by Professor Agassiz on the 'Plan of Creation.' It is with an ever new pleasure that our pub- lic come together to listen to this savant, still so young and already so celebrated. Not con- tent with pursuing in seclusion his laborious scientific investigations, he makes a habit of communicating, almost annually, to an audi- ence less restricted than that of the Academy the general result of some of his researches. All the qualities to which Mr. Agassiz has accustomed his listeners were found in the opening prelude ; the fullness and freedom of expression which give to his lectures the char- acter of a scientific causerie ; the dignified 396 LOUIS AGASS1Z. ease of bearing, joined with the simplicity and candor of a savant who teaches neither by aphorisms nor oracles, but who frankly admits the public to the results of his researches ; the power of generalization always based upon a patient study of facts, which he knows how to present with remarkable clearness in a lan- guage that all can understand. We will not follow the professor in tracing the outlines of his course. Suffice it to say that he in- tends to show in the general development of the animal kingdom the existence of a definite preconceived plan, successively carried out ; in other words, the manifestation of a higher thought, — the thought of God. This crea- tive thought may be studied under three points of view : as shown in the relations which, spite of their manifold diversity, con- nect all the species now living on the surface of the globe ; in their geographical distribu- tion ; and in the succession of beings from primitive epochs until the present condition of things." The summer of .1845 was the last which Agassiz passed at home. It was broken by a short and hurried visit to the glacier of the Aar, respecting which no details have been preserved. He did not then know that DEPARTURE FROM NEUCHATEL. 397 he was taking a final leave of his cabin among the rocks and ice. Affairs connected with the welfare of the institution in Neuchatel, with which he had been so long connected, still detained him for a part of the winter, and he did not leave for Paris until the first week in March, 1846. His wife and daughters had already preceded him to Germany, where he was to join them again on his way to Paris, and where they were to pass the period of his absence, under the care of his brother-in-law, Mr. Alexander Braun, then living at Carls- ruhe. His son was to remain at school at Neuchatel. It was two o'clock at night when he left his home of so many years. There had been a general sadness at the thought of his depar- ture, and every testimony of affection and respect accompanied him. The students came in procession with torchlights to give him a parting serenade, and many of his friends and colleagues were also present to bid him farewell. M. Louis Favre says in his Me- moir, " Great was the emotion at Neuchatel when the report was spread abroad that Agas- siz was about to leave for a long journey. It is true he promised to come back, but the New World might shower upon him such marvels 398 LOUIS AGASSIZ. that his return could hardly be counted upon. The young people, the students, regretted their beloved professor not only for his scien- tific attainments, but for his kindly disposi- tion, the charm of his eloquence, the inspira- tion of his teaching ; they regretted also the gay, animated, untiring companion of their excursions, who made them acquainted with nature, and knew so well how to encourage and interest them in their studies." Pausing at Carlsruhe on his journey, he proceeded thence to Paris, where he was wel- comed with the greatest cordiality by scien- tific men. In recognition of his work on the " Fossil Fishes " the Monthyon Prize of Phys- iology was awarded him by the Academy. He felt this distinction the more because the bearing of such investigations upon experi- mental physiology had never before been pointed out, and it showed that he had suc- ceeded in giving a new direction and a more comprehensive character to paleontological research. He passed some months in Paris, busily occupied with the publication of the " Systeme Glaciaire," his second work on the glacial phenomena. The "Etudes sur les Glaciers" had simply contained a resume* of all the researches undertaken upon the Al- SYSTEME GLACIAIRE. 399 pine fields of ice and the results obtained up to 1840, inclusive of the author's own work and his wider interpretation of the facts. The " Systeme Glaciaire " was, on the contrary, an account of a connected plan of investigation during a succession of years, upon a single glacier, with its geodetic and topographic fea- tures, its hydrography, its internal structure, its atmospheric conditions, its rate of annual and diurnal progress, and its relations to surround- ing glaciers. All the local phenomena, so far as they could be observed, were subjected to a strict scrutiny, and the results corrected by careful comparison, during five seasons. As we have seen, and as Agassiz himself says in his Preface, this band of workers had " lived in the intimacy of the glacier, striving to draw from it the secret of its formation and its an- nual advance." The work was accompanied by three maps and nine plates. In such a volume of detail there is no room for pictur- esque description, and little is told of the wonderful scenes they witnessed by day and night, nothing of personal peril and adven- ture. This task concluded, he went to England, where he was to spend the few remaining days previous to his departure. Among the 400 LOUIS AGASS1Z. last words of farewell which reached him just as he was leaving the Old World, little thinking then that he was to make a perma- nent home in America, were these lines from Humboldt, written at Sans Souci : "Be happy in this new undertaking, and preserve for me the first place under the head of friendship in your heart. When you return I shall be here no more, but the king and queen will receive you on this ' historic hill ' with the affection which, for so many reasons, you merit. . . . " Your illegible but much attached friend, " A. HUMBOLDT." So closed this period of Agassiz's life. The next was to open in new scenes, under wholly different conditions. He sailed for America in September, 1846. BOOKS BY LOUIS AGASSIZ, Published by HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY, 4 PARK STREET, BOSTON; ii EAST I;TH STREET, NEW YORK. METHODS OF STUDY IN NATURAL HISTORY. By Louis AGASSIZ. With Illustrations. i6mo, $1.50. CONTENTS: I. General Sketch of the Early Progress in Natural History II. Nomenclature and Classification. III. Categories of Classification. IV. Classification and Creation. V. Different Views respecting Orders. VI. Gradation among Animals. VII. Analogous Types. VIII. Family Characteristics. IX. The Cnaracter of Genera. X. Species and Breeds. XI. Formation of Coral Reefs. XII. Age of Coral Reefs as showing Permanence of Species. XIII. Homologies. XIV. Alternate Generations. XV. The Ovarian Egg. XVI. Embryology and Classification. Skillfully planned, and tersely written ; and while embodying many general hints as to the method by which scientific truth has been reached, it sketches the history of science in past times. The knowledge which it imparts so gracefully is of the most interesting character, and is enforced by apposite and practical illustration. A more delightful scientific work we have never chanced to encounter ; and we therefore cordially commend it to all classes of readers. — New York Albion. Never before has science been so completely popularized. — Philadelphia, Press. We commend them as giving in popular form the general out- line and many local details of the glacial theory which Agassiz elaborated to cosmic proportions from Charpentier's more limited groundwork, and for which he labored and battled against potent adversaries during many years, until from a hypothesis he reduced it to a demonstration. — New York World. The simple grace of style, the pure and idiomatic English, itself a model for the student, the clearness of illustration, the certainty of the author's grasp of his subject, give them a wonderful charm, even to those who neither know nor care for their subject. Some men can make any subject interesting to any one. Among these Professor Agassiz was prominent. — Portland Press. A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL ,3y Professor and Mrs. Louis AGASSIZ. With eight full-page Illustrations and many smaller ones, from photographs and sketches. 8vo, $5.00. CONTENTS I. Voyage from New York to Rio de Janeiro. II. Rio de Janeiro and its Environs — Juiz de Fora. III. Life in Rio — Fazenda Life. IV. Voyage up the Coast to Para. V. From Para to Manaos. VI. Life at Manaos — Voyage from Manaos to Tabatinga. VII. Life in Tefee. VIII. Return to Manaos — Amazonian Picnic. IX. Manaos and its Neighborhood. X. Excursion to Mauhes and its Neighborhood. XI. Return to Manaos — Excursion on the Rio Negro. XII. Down the River to Para — Excursions on the Coast. XIII. Physical History of the Amazons. XIV. Ceara. XV. Public Institutions of Rio — Organ Mountains. XVI. General Impressions of Brazil. Appendix. The volume possesses a high degree of interest in the richness of its details concerning the manners and customs, social life, and natural scenery, of Brazil, its animated and often picturesque nar- rative, and the graceful freedom and simplicity of its style. — New York Tribune. The narrative is interwoven with some of the more general re- sults of Prof. Agassiz's scientific observations, especially his in« quiries into the distribution of the fishes in the greatest hydro- graphic basin in the world, and the proof of the former existence of glaciers throughout its extent. The vegetation of the tropics, seen by Prof. Agassiz from a paleontological point of view, is drawn in charming pictures by Mrs. Agassiz's pen- — Journal of Travel and Natural History (London). A most charming and instructive volume. It will be an indis- pensable companion for every traveller in Brazil ; and its intrinsic merits assure for it general favor and circulation. — Pall Mall Ga- zette. A more charming volume of travels we have seldom met with. — Springfield Republican. It is impossible to give the reader an idea of the wealth in the volume. — Boston Transcript. SEASIDE STUDIES IN NATURAL HISTORY, By ELIZABETH C. AGASSIZ and ALEXANDER AGASSIZ. With one hundred and eighty-five Illustrations. 8vo, $3.00. This beautiful volume is an admirable companion for the sea- side resident or tourist, especially for all who are capable of pleas- ure from looking at or studying the life of the sea. Professor Alexander Agassiz gives the results of his own extended observa- tions and profound researches, relating to the structure, habits, growth, development from the embryo, and other characteristics of New England polyps, jelly-fishes or medusae, and star-fishes, illustrating his descriptions with numerous artistic figures ; and Mrs. Agassiz adds to the volume the charm of her graceful pen. " Seaside Studies in Natural History " is a work for the learned as well as unlearned, fitted to give all delight and instruction. — Professor JAMES D. DANA, in American Journal of Science. LOUIS AGASSIZ: HIS LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE. Edited by ELIZABETH C. AGASSIZ. With Portraits and Illustrations. 2 vols. crown Svo. $4.00. This volume gives a full account of Professor Agassiz, his work and writings, and also contains copious selections from his correspondence. It is the most extended biography of him which has ever been published. GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES. By Louis AGASSIZ. First Series. With Illustrations. i6mo, $1.50. CONTENTS: I. America the Old World. II. The Silurian Beach. III. The Fern Forests of the Carboniferous Period. IV. Mountains and their Origin. V. The Growth of Continents. VI. The Geological Middle Age. VII. The Tertiary Age, and its Characteristic Animals. VIII. The Formation of Glaciers. IX. Internal Structure and Progression of Glaciers. X. External Appearance of Glaciers. This work has been extensively read and admired for the sim- plicity and beauty of its style, the vividness of its descriptions of Nature, and the grandeur of its views of the -world's progress. Professor Agassiz reviews the prominent events of the successive eras in a manner that cannot fail to charm and instruct the most unscientific reader. — American Journal of Science. The style of these essays is clear ; the information such as to stimulate, as well as enlighten, the mind ; and the illustrations serve as good aids to the thorough comprehension of the text. — Boston Transcript. GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES. By Louis AGASSIZ. Second Series. i6mo, $1.50. CONTENTS: I. Glacial Period. II. The Parallel Roads of Glen Roy, in Scotland. III. Ice-Period in America. IV. Glacial Phenomena in Maine. V. Physical History of the Valley of the Amazon. This volume, taken in connection with the first series of " Geo- logical Sketches," presents in a permanent form, and in their proper order, all the essays Professor Agassiz wrote in his ma- turer years on geological and glacial phenomena. These papers, rich with accumulated stores of scientific lore, and seeming, in their simple but animated and engaging style, to be genuine outgrowths of their author's temperament, as well as of his wisdom, need no recommendation. — Boston Advertiser. BIOLOGY LIBRARY Califomi* iKtttute *f Techndogy THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ SCIENCE LIBRARY This book is due on the last DATE stamped below. To renew by phone, call 459-2050. Books not returned or renewed within 14 days after due date are subject to billing. MAY 3 1 19 JUN16 1994 8 tU Scries 2477