WALCOTT. — ALEXANDER AGASSIZ. 37 



of the Museum of Comparative Zoology were coming from the press. 

 These publications began to appear in 1863-64 and in the number of 

 important and finely illustrated papers which are presented there, 

 they have been excelled by few only of the great and most active 

 scientific societies of the world, yet the expense of producing them 

 was largely borne by Agassiz. 



ISIuch has been said about the great sums of money spent by him 

 upon the monument he raised in filial piety to the memory of his father, 

 and which he duly commemorated in that characteristically simple 

 inscription upon the walls of the Museum "Alexander, son of Louis 

 Agassiz, to his father." The voice of the public has named it the 

 Agassiz Museum — father and son were both content to call it the 

 Museum of Comparative Zoology. Whatever legally that title may 

 be, the memory of these two lives will possess a force greater than the 

 statute, and will preserve for generations to come the name common to 

 the enthusiastic founder and to the wise, patient and munificent 

 builder. Whatever Agassiz's contributions in money may have 

 been and others, not he counted them up to sums exceeding any thus 

 far made to the University, yet he gave a greater still in the devotion 

 of himself to the task of de\'eloping and making secure the future activi- 

 ties of the Museum. All the material successes he had won in other 

 fields he pledged to the support of the Museum after he had satisfied 

 the reasonable requirements of his family, but of his own labors he 

 made no reservation. The Museum had all that he could bestow. 



On the pages of the ciuincjuennial catalogue of Harvard College are 

 enumerated the distinctions conferred upon him by universities, 

 learned societies and foreign governments, they are a sufficient proof 

 of the esteem in which he was held throughout the world. Such dis- 

 tinctions sometimes reveal a more than passive recipient, but they 

 came to him absolutely unsought. His intimates even had little 

 knowledge of the honors bestowed upon him, and rarely obtained it 

 from himself. 



The great gold Victoria Research Medal given to him in 1909, was 

 shown to his friends, but this was more for the exquisite beauty of 

 the workmanship of the Medal, than for the pride in receiving it. He 

 had a keen appreciation of anything that had artistic merit and sur- 

 rounded himself in his home with many beautiful objects of art col- 

 lected in his travels from all parts of the world. In addition to the 

 Victoria Research Medal of the Royal Geographical Society, he liad 

 received the Walker Grand prize of the Boston Society of Natural 

 History and in 1878 the Serres prize of the French Academy of 

 Sciences, the first foreigner to be so honored. 



