1852-55.] ILLNESS AT CHARLESTON. 



57 



and class of Agassiz at the beginning of 1856, making 

 a specialty of living fishes, and took charge of that 

 important branch of the collections when the Agassiz 

 Museum was inaugurated in 1860. He has since en- 

 tirely given up his zoological work, and turned to eth- 

 nology and prehistoric man, and is now director of the 

 Peabody Museum at Harvard University. 



I may add to this first list of Agassiz's pupils in 

 America the entomologist, Dr. John L. Leconte, who 

 often came to Cambridge as a guest of Professor Agas- 

 siz, and learned much from the great store of knowl- 

 edge and methods of studying of the professor ; and as 

 an acknowledgment of the benefits received from these 

 visits, he bestowed his large, important, and rich ento- 

 mological collection upon the Agassiz Museum. Dr. 

 Joseph Leconte, a cousin, was also a pupil at Charles- 

 ton, South Carolina, and also at Cambridge. He has 

 since published a Manual of geology, based in part on 

 the lectures of Professor Agassiz, which has given him 

 a certain reputation, and he has also become professor 

 of geology at the State University of California. 



Agassiz's annual visit to Charleston, South Carolina, 

 was attended by most serious illness, an attack of 

 that southern fever generally called malaria, - - which 

 brought him to death's door. His life was at mo- 

 ments despaired of, and he was in great danger for 

 many days. This illness incapacitated him for two 

 months, from Christmas, 1852, until the end of Feb- 

 ruary, 1853, when, with his unconquerable energy, he 

 again began to deliver his lectures before the Medical 



