486 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 
out the first part of the quarto volume on the Fishes of the 
Brazilian Expedition of Spix and Martius before he took 
his degree of Doctor of Philosophy, and completed it before 
he proceeded to that of Doctor in Medicine in 1830. The 
work opened his way to fame, but brought no money. Still, 
as Martius defrayed all the expenses, the net result com- 
pared quite favorably with that of later publications. More- 
over, out of it possibly issued his own voyage to Brazil in 
later years, under auspices such as his early patron never 
dreamed of. 
This early work also made him known to Cuvier; so that 
when he went to Paris, a year afterwards, to continue his 
medical and scientific studies, — the one, as he deemed, from 
necessity, the other from choice, —he was received as a fellow- 
savant. Yet at first with a certain reserve, probably no more 
than was natural in view of the relative age and position of 
the two men; but Agassiz, writing to his sister, says: ‘This 
extreme but formal politeness chills you instead of putting 
you at your ease; it lacks cordiality, and to tell the truth, I 
would gladly go away if I were not held fast by the wealth of 
material of which I can avail myself.” But only a month 
later he writes — this time to his uncle — that, while he was 
anxious lest he “might not be allowed to examine, and still 
less to describe, the fossil fishes and their skeletons in the 
Museum, . . . knowing that Cuvier intended to write a work 
on this subject,” and might naturally wish to reserve the ma- 
terials for his own use, and when the young naturalist, as he 
showed his own sketches and notes to the veteran, was faintly 
venturing to hope that, on seeing his work so far advanced, 
he might perhaps be invited to share in a joint publication, 
Cuvier relieved his anxiety and more than fulfilled his half- 
formed desires. 
“ He desired his secretary to bring him a certain portfolio of 
drawings. He showed me the contents: they were drawings 
of fossil fishes, and notes which he had taken in the British 
Museum and elsewhere. After looking it through with me, 
he said he had seen with satisfaction the manner in which I 
had treated this subject; that I had, indeed, anticipated him, 
