LOUIS AGASSIZ 149 



mined that he should be a business man or a physician; the son 

 was equally determined to follow the study of his choice and he 

 won by the very greatness, the loftiness of his appeals, and the 

 logic of his well-supported arguments. 



The very element of semi-poverty would have discouraged the 

 average boy alone, but to Agassiz it was another reason for suc- 

 cess, and in this determination, reinforced by lucid demonstra- 

 tions, one sees the explanation of his successes in the various epochs 

 of his career which led to the lofty pinnacle upon which he stood 

 when he passed on into history. 



Agassiz's youth was spent in the open. Until the age of ten he 

 roamed the fields a devoted student of every branch of nature, 

 from the song of the birds to the deep snows and glaciers of his 

 mountains. During this period he studied with his parents. He 

 displayed not only a remarkable love for animals, but a peculiar 

 desire to know all about them, their structure, and habits; and at 

 this time we find him an all around investigator, not only studying 

 living fishes in a home-made aquarium, but watching the work of 

 mechanics of various kinds and copying their work. At ten years 

 of age he entered the University of Bienne, and at twelve had 

 a remarkable collection of animals and plants, committing the 

 Latin names to memory and compiling remarkable manuscripts; 

 in fact, tutoring himself "in the rudiments of many desperate 

 studies" and methods which, doubtless, had in later years to be 

 unlearned. Indeed he says, "I am conscious that at successive 

 periods of my life I have employed very different systems of study." 



When very young Agassiz began to buy books relating to the 

 studies of his choice. In the later years of his life at Bienne, he 

 announced his strong desire to become a naturalist, but his father 

 believing it would mean a life of comparative poverty, determined 

 that he should follow a business career, and while Agassiz was 

 secretly preparing to become the great savant, the father was 

 laying plans for his entering the firm of his uncle at Neuchatel; 

 but Agassiz succeeded in holding off the decision, and entered 

 the College of Lausanne where he met many scientific men who in- 

 fluenced his career. Here he had first access to collections of 



