150 Professor Forbes on tlic First JJiscoctiy of the 



made his communication on the Gth September in the same 

 year, consequently M. Agassiz could not have revisited the 

 Glaciers in the interval. The communication at Bale was 

 therefore, no doubt, a repetition of the communication at Por- 

 rentruy made eight days before, and the drawing of Agassiz 

 was probably done from memory after the drawing of Guyot. 

 At least, I am at a loss to explain these seemingly independ- 

 ent communications in any other way, nor will I even put the 

 question, Avhether the structure described was a vertical 

 structure at all. I do not suspect M. Agassiz of the reserve 

 of having made no mention at Porrentruy that the fact of 

 Guyot had been ascertained by himself, and then of hav- 

 ing gone immediately to claim it as original at Bale. I ap- 

 prehend rather that the Secretaries at Btile (to whose MS. 

 notes we are indebted alone for an}' knowledge of this trans- 

 action, forgotten even by the principal actor in it) had sup- 

 posed, from M. Agassiz' verbal communication (ih Tue voix), 

 that whilst relating what his friend M. Guyot had seen, he 

 was really giving an account of his own observations. 



I mention this as the explanation most natural and most fa- 

 vourable to M. Agassiz. But I would ask, if facts and theo- 

 ries are to be introduced thus into the history of science, where 

 is the i)alm of discovery ever to be bestowed ■? Surely a man 

 must have very little skill as an observer, and have exer- 

 cised still less thought to render his observations M^orth re- 

 cording, if he cannot recognise his own discovery when pointed 

 out to him, but is obliged to take the authority of his friends, 

 at the end of three years, that he ever knew it ! Such evi- 

 dence is barely tolerated in the ease of posthumous claims. I 

 suppose that this is the first instance of its being gravely urged 

 during life. That I may not be imagined to have brought 

 forward this claim more strongly than its author luis done, I 

 quote from his letter to myself. 



Extract Twelfth.— Pro/t*'*'or Acjcissiz to Professor Forbes. 



"Monsieur — Je re^ois la lettrc suivante de I\I. Dubois de Montpercxix 

 * * * dont je crois devoir voiis donner copic afin de vous prouver que 

 de nion cote j'avais aussi rcmarquc des 1838, hi structure lamellairc d'uiie 

 partie dcs glaciers, alor.s meuie que faute de plus araples details, je n'en 

 ai meulioune'e dans uion livro que ks ajipareiices superficiclles. Vous 



