1S82.] 5-^ [Lesley. 



his "Studies of Glaciers" appeared in 1840, and his "Glacial System" in 

 1847. 



For eight successive summers Agassiz and Desor lived upon the 

 glacier of the Aar, and each summer ascended, mostly for the first time, 

 one or more of the peaks of the Oberland. "With two friends and four 

 guides they were the first to stand on tlie summit of the Jungfrau. 



The great flat rock in the middle of the medial moraine of the glacier 

 of the Aar, pictures of which are so familiar to all readers of books treat- 

 ing of the glacial phenomena of the Alps, was called the "Hotel des 

 Neufchatelois," and during its slow majestic descent of the valley it enter- 

 tained more celebrities, and listened to more scientific talk than any other 

 house in Europe. All the world of science bent its steps, summer after 

 summer, to this unique council chamber in which caroused and debated 

 and slumbered side by side Agassiz, Desor, Vogt, Duchatelier, Nicollet, 

 Pourtales, Coulon, DePury, Dolfus-Ausset and their innumerable friends 

 and visitors. 



Perilous were the undertakings plotted beneath and executed from this 

 alpine boulder on the moving ice; and exciting beyond the common text 

 of scientific publication are the published descriptions of the first ascent of 

 the Schreckhorn, the first ascent of the Jungfrau, and especially the first 

 ascent of the terrible Galenstoc during which the son of Dolfus-Ausset 

 lost his life. 



Among the later comers was James Forbes, who, having learned from 

 the veterans of the glacier of the Aar all that close and long and repeated 

 observations could impart, established himself on the Mer de Glace, 

 repeated and verified their data, and then returned to England and antici- 

 pated their conclusions by publishing his own celebrated book on the 

 formation and movement of the ice. 



Vogt also settled in Neufchatel, but not until 1839, and assisted Agas- 

 siz for five years in natural history, especially in the preparation of his 

 work on the fresh water fishas. Vogt published in 1843 his Geburtshelf- 

 erkrote, and in 1843 his own book entitled "In the Mountains and on 

 the Glaciers." Vogt then went to Paris (in 1844) and stayed until 1846, 

 when he was appointed to a chair in his native city of Giessen. But the 

 troubles of 1848 breaking out, he became again a political exile, and 

 accepted the chair of geology at Geneva in 1852, and at Bern in 1853. 



This brilliant coterie of men of science, in the prime of life and in the 

 heal of investigation laying the foundations of more than one depart- 

 ment of human knowledge, included two other names of equal fame, 

 Arnold Guyot, and Leo Lesquereux, both of whom still live to illustrate 

 and enlarge our science. While Agassiz, Desor and Vogt were at work 

 in the mountains Guyot was at work on the plain ; while they studied the 

 movement of the glacier, he defined the limits of the ancient moraines. 

 As for Lesquereux, his study of the peat bogs of Switzerland, and then 



PKOC. AMER. PHILOS. SOC. XX. 113. 3n. PRINTED FEBRUARY 23, 1883. 



