264 LOUIS AGASSIZ. 



for a time over a world previously covered 

 with a rich vegetation and peopled with large 

 mammalia, similar to those now inhabiting the 

 warm regions of India and Africa. Death en- 

 veloped all nature in a shroud, and the cold, 

 having reached its highest degree, gave to 

 this mass of ice, at the maximum of tension, 

 the greatest possible hardness." In this novel 

 presentation the distribution of erratic boul- 

 ders, instead of being classed among local 

 phenomena, was considered " as one of the ac- 

 cidents accompanying the vast change occa- 

 sioned by the fall of the temperature of our 

 globe before the commencement of our epoch." 

 This was, indeed, throwing the gauntlet 

 down to the old expounders of erratic phe- 

 nomena upon the principle of floods, freshets, 

 and floating ice. Many well-known geologists 

 were present at the meeting, among them Leo- 

 pold von Buch, who could hardly contain his 

 indignation, mingled with contempt, for what 

 seemed to him the view of a youthful and in- 

 experienced 'observer. One would have liked 

 to hear the discussion which followed, in spe- 

 cial section, between Von Buch, Charpentier, 

 and Agassiz. Elie de Beaumont, who should 

 have made the fourth, did not arrive till later. 

 Difference of opinion, however, never dis- 



