CHARLESTON 45 



life to have an opportunity of learning to judge of the 

 time, by watching the shadows, and to seem really 

 gratified at entering upon this new branch of study. 



Shortly after his return to Cambridge from Charleston, 

 it became evident as Agassiz's library grew larger and his 

 children older that the quarters on Oxford Street were 

 too limited, and in 1854 the family moved into a house built 

 for them by the College on the corner of Quincy Street 

 and Broadway, which continued to be Mrs. Agassiz's home 

 for the rest of her life. "The house on Quincy Street was 

 a most delightful and homelike place," Miss Cary writes. 

 "At the right on entering was Lizzie's charming parlor. On 

 the left was Agassiz's fascinating, shabby library, full of 

 orderly disorder. Common wooden book-cases lined the 

 walls, filled with valuable books in shabby bindings. A 

 rickety ladder leaned against one side of the room, a fire 

 burned brightly in the grate, and brighter and more cheer- 

 ful than any fire, Agassiz sat at the long table, happy in his 

 studies. Behind the library was a study, and behind Lizzie's 

 parlor was the dining-room. There was in this delightful 

 house no luxury, but every comfort. Alex, Ida and Pauline 

 were young, handsome creatures, great favorites with every 

 one, full of life and gaiety; and their friends came freely 

 to the house, which rang with young voices, with laughter 

 and with cheerful talk." Its walls proved elastic and adapt- 

 able to the many and varied plans that were made under its 

 roof. Of these none demanded more radical changes than 

 one which materialized in 1856. By the spring of that year 

 the public lecturing by which Agassiz had endeavored 

 through the winter to supplement his all too narrow salary 

 of fifteen hundred dollars was proving so exhausting for his 



