LOUIS AGASSIZ. 239 



it belongs, but a mrre fragment of this frame-work, a single bone, a jaw, 

 a tooth is in most cases enough for this purpose. 



Tliese principles are based, above all, upon the comparative anatomy 

 of living animals, the study of which is indispensable to a knowledge of 

 extinct types. Agassiz applied them to that of fossil fishes, the collec- 

 tions of which contained at that time many specimens which had not 

 yet been examined. The public and private museums of England fur- 

 nished most of the material for his investigations, but those of the conti- 

 nent were also made to contribute. 



II. 



Hitherto we have seen Agassiz utilizing for the profit of science the 

 great resources placed at his disposal. His return to Switzerland, in 

 1832, makes us acquainted with a new attribute of his great mind, the 

 talent for creation and organization. The liberal encouragement of 

 Louis Coulon, and among others that of Humboldt, who exercised a 

 great influence over the Ejug of Prussia, then suzerain of Xeuchatel, 

 facilitated the establishment of Agassiz in that city. An annual com- 

 l^ensatiou of 80 louis as professor at the gymnasium, and the sale of his 

 collections for 500 louis, x)rovided the first resources necessary for the 

 continuation of his publications. He had not here, as at Munich and 

 Paris, immense stores of material at his command and illustrious men 

 of science to come to his aid. Everything was in an unformed condi- 

 tion ; but he was the i3ioneer, the chief, and he soon rallied about him a 

 group of naturalists, who recalled upon anotlier theater the " Little Acad- 

 emy" of Munich. The well-known names, Desor, C. Vogt, Gressly, 

 Guyot, Nicolet, of Montmollin, are connected with this period of his 

 life ; the fii^st two were his most active collaborators. Several of his 

 fellow- students of Munich — Weber, Dinkel, and Burckhardt — followed 

 him to this new residence, where they labored in the execution of his 

 designs ; one of them, a citizen of ]S"euchatel, H. Nicolet, opened at his 

 instigation a vast lithographic establishment, where all the plates of his 

 memoirs were executed. The modest chair he occupied became soon the 

 most distmguished of the gymnasium; the collections increased rapidly; 

 the public became interested ; a few young men entered into these re- 

 searches ; and thus was founded, in 1833, under the presidency of L. 

 Coulon, the Society of ]S"atural History, of which Agassiz was the secre- 

 tary and the soul for many years. Neuchatel became an important sci- 

 entific centre ; thence proceeded successively and at short intervals 

 voluminous scientific publications of the first order. 



In 1839 he published the commencement of his Hisioirc naturclJe dcs 

 Poissons cFeau douce de VEurope centrale, which contains the embryology 

 of the Salmonides by C. Vogt. This work, undertaken on a very exten- 

 sive plan, was never completed. 



The history of fossil fishes, begun at Paris, was terminated at this 

 period. The first part appeared in 1833, at his own expense, but his 



