12 MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY 



The science of Palaeontology has had its ups and downs. The in- 

 vertebrate field has been extraordinarily well represented and the 

 invertebrate collections have been used both for instruction and re- 

 search most effectively. These collections are vast and derived from 

 all parts of the world. 



After Louis Agassiz's death his son Alexander took charge of the 

 Museum of Comparative Zoology as Curator, as the head of the 

 Institution was then called. Later he became Director of the Uni- 

 versity Museum, of which the Museum of Comparative Zoology, now 

 better known as the Agassiz Museum, is also a part. He disliked 

 teaching as much as his father enjoyed it. He closed the Museum to 

 all but advanced research workers, and the Museum came to be less 

 and less known in America, though more and more famous abroad. 

 Alexander Agassiz, who was as shy and retiring as his father had 

 been genial and expansive, was, nevertheless, a person of extraordi- 

 nary charm of manner and tenderness of heart. Concerning this I 

 speak at first hand. His unrivalled knowledge of marine life acquired 

 during the seaside studies made in his early years, supplemented by 

 extensive reading, led him for many years to collect assiduously in 

 New England and to undertake zoological exploration abroad. The 

 results he frequently worked up himself. 



These results make up his great classical contributions to science. 

 During his later years he explored widely and made great collections 

 which were distributed to specialists while he himself, turning aside 

 from general zoology, began to accumulate data and observations 

 concerning the coral reefs. These studies have provided information 

 in the form of charts and photographs of importance to geologists 

 and others interested in the coral reef problem. Unfortunately, 

 Mr. Agassiz did not write any general conclusions as the result of 

 the years which he devoted to his survey of coral reefs, to the ex- 

 clusion of those zoological investigations which, by training and 

 early experience, he was better fitted to pursue. Nevertheless his re- 

 ports afford some general ideas of what he thought upon the sub- 

 ject. To his death he kept up his interest in the Echini and was 

 the authority concerning this group. 



To keep his section of the University Museum progressing he was 

 forced to spend a large part of his time securing the wherewithal so 

 to do. The romantic story of his development of the Calumet mine 



