150 LEADING AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



scientific value. Here in 1823 he listened to his first lecture in 

 Zoology. 



Seeing that they could not influence him his family virtually 

 surrendered, or a compromise was effected through Dr. Mathias 

 Mayor, and Agassiz entered the medical school at Zurich which 

 he considered a step in the right direction. Some idea of the charm- 

 ing personality of Agassiz can be formed from the following 

 incident. With a few friends he was on a walking trip through 

 the country where he met en roiite, a gentlemen who invited them 

 to join him at lunch, during which, he was so impressed with the 

 young student that he later expressed a desire to adopt him, and 

 to undertake his complete education, a consummation which would 

 have been accomplished had not family ties between the boy and 

 his parents been so strong. All who met young Agassiz fell under 

 the potent charm of his personality and it was noted that his pro- 

 fessors took exceptional interest in him. In this way his acquaint- 

 ance was increased and he was enabled to meet men of impor- 

 tance, and to borrow books. It is difficult for the reader to-day, 

 when every village has its library, to realize that young Agassiz 

 had the greatest difficulty in obtaining books. They were rare, 

 and he did not possess the money to buy them; and that this can 

 be thoroughly appreciated, it may be said that he spent days and 

 weeks copying books that he had borrowed, which he could not 

 afford to buy, that he might at least own a copy, while pages and 

 chapters of others were committed to memory. It would be diffi- 

 cult to imagine a modern boy copying two volumes of Lamarck's 

 Animaux sans Vertebres, that he might have the material at hand. 



The character of Agassiz was influenced greatly by the men he 

 associated with at this time. This is not strange, but it is remark- 

 able that he should have sought the friendship of such men and 

 preferred it; and that he might reap the full value of this associa- 

 tion he entered Heidelberg University in 1820. He now met 

 Leuckart, Tiedemann and Braun, who gave him every possible 

 aid. His life now was that of a student actuated by a remarkable 

 prescience. The ordinary frivolities of youth did not enter into his 

 composition; not that he was not full of life, fond of sports, but 



