12 LOUIS AGASSI/.. [CHAP. xin. 



tinuancc of about ten years, during the last three of 

 which they were often turbulent and even violent. 



Desor, after all his accusations against the man who 

 had made him what he was, was bold enough to pretend 

 that he had remained silent, and had only threatened to 

 expose Agassiz ; as if he had not attacked him in every 

 way, both verbally and in print. (See " Synopsis des 

 Echinides fossiles," par E. Desor, p. xx. Paris, 1858.) 



The intervention of Professor Karl Vogt, an honest, 

 but not always very exact and well-informed man, rather 

 inclined by his eager disposition to see only one side of 

 things, and to turn into ridicule every other view and 

 opinion, has led me to give the real facts of the case, 

 although I pass over many details. How Vogt in his 

 biography of Desor ( " Eduard Desor, Lebensbild eines 

 Naturforschers," von Karl Vogt, in Deutsche Bucherei, 

 in Zwanglosen Helten. IV. Serie, Heft 24. Breslau) 

 could have declared that the award was in favour of 

 Desor, it is difficult to understand, except on the sup- 

 position that he never saw the paper cither in manu- 

 script or printed, and was deceived by some one. 



The scheme which he had prepared was an utter 

 failure, happily for the natural history of America. 

 I Ie hoped to oblige Agassiz to leave Cambridge, and 

 even the United States, when he meant to step in 

 and take his place both officially and socially. Desor 

 thought highly of himself, and over-shot his mark, 

 lie never was more than a second or third-rate 

 naturalist, at the best, unable to go out of the beaten 

 paths opened to him by Agassiz, Gressly, and Keller. 

 lie had no originality whatever, and seemed never 



