170 LOUIS AGASSIZ. [CHAP. xxi. 



undisguised terms for eight years. A few months after, 

 at the Athenaeum Club in London, Thomas Huxley 

 said to me, " Agassiz is a backwoodsman in natural 

 history. He clears up the forest, cutting down all 

 errors, theories, without regard to persons or estab- 

 lished reputation. What a pioneer!" 



Some years before, at the meeting of the Swiss natu- 

 ralists at Geneva, in 1865, I heard John Tyndall say, 

 " If Bishop Rendu had been a physicist, he would have 

 left nothing for me to do ; for after the experiments of 

 Agassiz on the Aar glacier, all the main facts of the 

 glacier motion and mechanism were so well established 

 as to leave nothing but a question of pure physics, 

 which was as nearly as possible solved by Rendu's 

 theory." Tyndall expressed, without reserve, his admi- 

 ration of Agassiz's work, and his dissent from James 

 Forbes's theory and claims in regard to the structure 

 of ice. 



Agassiz was never a good judge of character; and he 

 too often associated with himself persons either unfit 

 for the work assigned to them, or not in a condition to 

 render the services expected. He was too easily led by 

 flattery, and was apt to trust any one who made a show 

 of devotion to the progress of science, and spoke grand- 

 iloquently of the sanctity of the sacred office of carry- 

 in": on researches in various scientific fields. He was 



O 



imposed upon by the airs assumed by a certain number 

 of half savants, who are to be found everywhere, but in 

 greater number in America, where they have received 

 the name "Almighty Savants." 



His professorship of zoology and geology, on his 



