B.] FORBES, GUYOT, AND AGASSIZ. 557 



EXTRACT TENTH. From Professor Forbes to Professor Guyot of 



'EDINBURGH, April 2SM, 1S42. 



' MY DEAR SIR, In a printed letter which M. Agassiz has forwarded to me, I 



find a memorandum (printed for the first time) from your manuscript, contain- 



;i account of the structure of the Glacier of the Gries, observed in 



. and stated to have been read at a meeting of naturalists at Porrentruy, 



'I have no hesitation in saying that that nofr describes clearly a structure 

 similar to that which 1 observed and pointed out to M. Agassiz and Mr. Heath 

 on the Glacier of the Aar, on the 9th of August last. 



' Whilst, then, 1 am most ready to do you full justice in respect to the 



originality and clearness of your observation, you will, I doubt not, as freely 



admit, that not having the pleasure of your acquaintance at the time of my 



observing and ascertaining the exist nice and modifications of this structure on 



Lar (ilacier, and never having heard, to the best of my recollection, during 



'Urse of my stay in Switzerland, of your having made such an observation, 



I could not, in any respect, have borrowed it from you. As no printed record 



ur communication then existed, I could not, of course, have learned of it 



from books. You \\i\\ also, 1 doubt not, candidly admit, that your having 



, to publish your observation in any even the most abridged abstract, your 



having omitted to press it as a fact important in the theory of glaciers upon any 



i lends, and especially on M. Agassiz, who was writing a book 



on the subject, shows that the observation had not excited either on your part 



or that of your auditors at Porrentruy, any very lively interest. The fact itself 



would probably have been soon lost to science, if it had not been revived last 



summer by re-discovery, and by a strong indication of its generality and 



importance in the theories now agitated. 



* * * 4 



MC in the slightest degree conversant with questions of this kind will 

 see, on reading M. Agassi/' letter, that your observations, communicated three 

 before at a provincial meeting, not published even in the vaguest form 

 ID the minutes of the proceedings, nor alluded to in their writings by an 

 of the contemporary authors who are stated to have been present, 'leave my 

 claim to have made the observation independently, and first insisted on its 

 importance and generality, quite unimpeached. 



***** 



' My firm belief is, tha M. Agassi/ had totally forgotten this passage in the 



igs at Porrentruy. I believe him to be incapable of th- 

 tained duplicity of affected ignorance and surprise when 1 first pointed out the 

 s notice on the 0th of August. 1 believe his present newly dis- 

 ! for your originality in this matter to be occasioned solely by finding 

 it impracticable to maintain the charge against me of plagiarism ami ingratitude 

 towards himself, which he at first alone ui 



i in which M. Agassiz has placed himself appears to be this : 

 iie was acquainted with this structure of ice on the 9th of August, 

 or he was not. 



4 If he was not acquainted with it, he learned it from me; for he has i 

 |ted to maintain that he showed it 1" 



was acquainted with it he learned it from yon. And if he learned it 

 from cither of us, how does he claim it as his own in the letter to Ilnmboldt, 



'. not vet published 'r 

 I am, my Of 



.1 v M i s I > 



