108 NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 
Neuchatel in 1837 and produced a sensation throughout the scien- 
tific world. It was combated and ridiculed, but in course of time 
it has found universal acceptance, though in a modified form. 
Agassiz never lost interest in the subject, and made extensive 
and important contributions to it in later years. He intended 
to publish a comprehensive work on the results obtained through 
the researches of himself and his associates, but the enterprise 
was frustrated by the revolution of 1848, after the publication 
of the first volume. “If to Venetz and Charpentier belongs 
the honor of having first proved the transportation of the Swiss 
erratic boulders by the agency of ice, and the existence of 
great glaciers formerly extending to the Jura, to Agassiz we 
must award the merit of having given to these facts their full 
geological significance, of having brought them before the 
world at large and having made the glacial question, as it were, 
the order of the day.” (Guyot.) 
Important as were these glacial researches of Agassiz, his 
friend Humboldt thought it unfortunate that he should be 
diverted from natural history investigations, and on that account 
induced the King of Prussia to send him on a scientific mission 
for the comparison of the faunas of temperate Europe and 
America. At the same time Agassiz received an invitation to 
lecture before the Lowell Institute in Boston. He came to 
America in 1846, and, as is well known, made an extraordinary 
impression in scientific circles and on the public at large. “ Be- 
fore him America had had many able representatives of the 
science of nature, fully appreciated abroad, but too much 
ignored by the mass of the people at home, who had not yet 
espoused the cause. Sympathy and efficient aid had been want- 
ing. The stirring appeals of Agassiz were heard and the nation 
nobly responded.” (Guyot.) 
Professor Bache, Superintendent of the Coast Survey, gave 
him opportunities for investigations of marine life on the 
Atlantic Coast and among the Florida Reefs. Means were 
found for an expedition to Brazil and the Amazon, and for the 
publication of his ‘‘ Contributions to the Natural History of the 
