280 LOUIS AGASSIZ. 



Professor Auguste de la Rive, who writes in 

 his own private person. Promptitude and 

 silence, then, are the two recommendations 

 which I make to you while we await the Yes 

 we so greatly desire. . . . 



More tempting still must have been the offi- 

 cial invitation received a few months later to a 

 professorship at Lausanne, strengthened as it 

 was by the affectionate entreaties of relations 

 and friends, urging him for the sake of fam- 

 ily ties and patriotism to return to the canton 

 where he had passed his earlier years. But he 

 had cast in his lot with the Neuchatelois and 

 was proof against all arguments. He remained 

 faithful to the post he had chosen until he 

 left it, temporarily as he then believed, to 

 come to America. The citizens of his adopted 

 town expressed their appreciation of his loy- 

 alty to them in a warm letter of thanks, beg- 

 ging, at the same time, his acceptance of the 

 sum of six thousand francs, payable by install- 

 ments during three years. 



The summer of 1837 was a sad one to 

 Agassiz and to his whole family ; his father 

 died at Concise, carried off by a fever while 

 still a comparatively young man. The pretty 

 parsonage, to which they were so much at- 



