266 LOUIS AGASSIZ. [CHAP. xi. 



" Croyez-vous que j'ai ete toujours a la noce avec lui; ' 

 showing how much he had to endure from the disposi- 

 tion of his colleague in the construction of the Geological 

 Map of France. 



On this day the glacial theory at last gained the 

 ascendency in France. De Beaumont, for two years 

 longer, continued an underhanded opposition by means 

 of some of his favourite pupils, Messrs. Durocher and 

 Frappoli. But Charles Martins, a remarkable speaker 

 and good writer, took the question where Agassiz left it, 

 and easily extinguished all opposition. Now it may seem 

 strange to many that such a clear question, with such 

 admirable and visible proofs, should have encountered 

 such a powerful opposition, and arraigned against it such 



f 



geologists as Alexander von Humboldt, von Buch, Elie 

 de Beaumont, and Murchison. Geology is too vast for 

 any one man, whatever his intellectual capacity and 

 knowledge, to be a good judge and an expert on all the 

 questions which arise. At the beginning of the crea- 

 tion of modern geology it was the custom for every 

 one to give his opinions on each point. In this way, 

 a number of errors were accepted as facts ; and it 

 required generations of able observers to remove these 

 great obstacles to the progress of geology. The belief 

 in the transportation of boulders by great mud currents, 

 in connection with the universal deluge of the Mosaic 

 tradition, was so deeply implanted in the minds, even 

 of savants, that it was not an easy task for Venetz, 

 de Charpentier, and Agassiz to uproot it. It laid upon 

 them a quarter of a century of hard work and harder 

 fighting. 



