1 843-44.] HUGH MILLER. 225 



sandstone the most wonderful forms of animals yet 

 found. Agassiz says of some of them : " It is im- 

 possible to see aught more bizarre in all creation than 

 the Pterichthyan genus : the same astonishment that 

 Cuvier felt in examining the Plesiosaunis, I myself ex- 

 perienced, when Mr. H. Miller, the first discoverer of 

 these fossils, showed me the specimens which he had 

 detected in the Old Red Sandstone of Cromarty." As 

 early as 1831, Miller found the Pterichthys, or winged 

 fish; but Agassiz did not hear of it until 1838, when a 

 description and drawing was shown him in Paris by 

 an English naturalist : he was greatly interested in this 

 new form of life, and very anxious to see more of it. 

 The following* extract from Hugh Miller's principal and 

 most popular work, "The Old Red Sandstone," explains 

 how Agassiz was first made acquainted with Miller's 

 wonderful discoveries : 



A letter which I wrote early in 1838 to Dr. Malcolmson, then at 

 Paris, and which contained a rude drawing of the Pterichthys, was 

 submitted to Agassiz, and the curiosity of the naturalist was excited. 

 He examined the figure, rather, however, with interest than sur- 

 prise, and read the accompanying description, not in the least 

 inclined to scepticism by the singularity of its details. He had 

 looked on too many wonders of a similar cast to believe that he 

 had exhausted them, or to evince any astonishment that geology 

 should be found to contain one wonder more ("The Old Red 

 Sandstone 11 by Hugh Miller, p. 119, Boston, 1854). 



Although Agassiz had great sympathy and very cor- 

 dial relations with Hugh Miller, their correspondence 

 was extremely limited. Mrs. Agassiz says that with 

 a single exception no letters have been found from 

 him among Agassiz's papers ; and she gives that unique 

 Q 



