132 PROFESSOR AGASSIZ ON ICHTHYOLITBS. 



Utility and importance to science are so decidedly pronounced, that 

 there is now no fear of a cessation of their continuance from any 

 rational cause whatsoever. We look forward, therefore, with much 

 confidence to a very considerable increase in the number of Sub- 

 scribers at the next anniversary, and we hope to see it even exceed in 

 splendour and attractiveness to that which we have been thus particu- 

 larizing. — It has been suggested to us, by many studious men ot 

 eminence, that literature, domestic and foreign, should form one of 

 its prominent objects in future meetings ; and we are of opinion 

 that there is much shrewdness and plausibility in this observation. 

 There is a certain aridness in long discussions on scientific themes 

 which would be well relieved by occasional dissertations on elegant 

 literature — and we are impressed with this conviction the more 

 forcible from the circumstance that those lectures which in the 

 slightest degree partook of this character were the most crowded 

 and the most regarded. Even philosophers cannot be always on 

 stilts, and variety, judiciously blended, is said, and truly said, to 

 give a zest to most of the intellectual gratifications of life. 



I^We have given this report as fully as our limits will allow, — to 

 have given it as minutely as, perhaps, it ought to have been, would 

 require the space of a thick octavo volume. With respect to its cor- 

 rectness, we can speak confidently, for so important did we consider 

 the meeting, in numerous points of view — national, scientific, and 

 literary — that we travelled to the Irish capital, for the sole pur- 

 pose of watching all the movements of this learned assembly, and of 

 furnishing our readers with a faithful analysis of its proceedings, 

 from personal observation. This report, therefore, is not drawn 

 from the evidence, or hear- say, or imagination of others ; and how- 

 ever defective it may appear in copiousness, our readers will find 

 that, in its general, and even in its minute, particulars, it lays just 

 claim to the merit of scrupulous faithfulness.] 



PROFESSOR AGASSIZ ON ICHTHYOLITES. 



A splendid work, which will prove alike interesting to the 

 student of Ichthyology and the geologist, is now in the course of 

 publication, by Professor Agassiz, of Neuchatel. The subject of it 

 is Ichthyol'ites or Fossil Fishes. 



From the prospectus of the Recherches sur les Poissons Fossiies, 

 now lying before us, we learn that the first part flivraisonj was 

 published in September, 1833; the second, in February, 1834: 

 and that it would continue to appear regularly every four months 

 until the whole is completed. The fifth part was laid before the 

 British Association at Dublin, by the learned Professor. 



