LOUIS JOHN RUDOLPH AGASSIZ. 105 



could not be sent to Neufchatel. The expense, too, waa 

 far beyond his slender means, so that, despite the 

 aid obtained through Huniboldt and other warm 

 friends, he incurred heavy debts which hamper* <1 

 him for many years. He was, however, a man 

 who counted neither money, nor time, nor labour, 

 when knowledge was in the balance, and he hesitated 

 not to enter on new and intricate investigations in 

 the midst of his original work. 



Being greatly interested in the subject, he found 

 time to devote to the study of living fishes. Thus 

 may be mentioned his treatise on the cyprinoids, 

 published in 1834 ; the great work brought out in 

 conjunction with Carl Yogt between 1839 and 1845, 

 on the fresh-water fishes of Central Europe. In 1842 

 he brought out his important " Nomenclator Zoologi- 

 cus," the result of many years' gatherings, and which 

 contained an alphabetical arrangement of the specific 

 names of the entire animal kingdom, their etymology, 

 information as to the authors who had proposed these 

 names, as well as the year of their appearance. The 

 " Nomenclator " found a magnificent conclusion in the 

 " Bibliographic Grenerale d'Histoire Naturelle," printed 

 at the cost of the Bay Society. 



Such was the mental capacity of Agassiz, not 

 yet thirty years of age, and such his endurance of 

 continuous labour, that these numerous threads of 

 research, instead of producing a hopeless tangle in 

 his mind, seemed each to serve as a separate clue to 

 the truth of nature. 



While he, no doubt, exercised a considerable influ- 



