4 88 PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 



and Mrs. Agassiz and published under the title A Journey 

 in Brazil. 



In the autumn of 1869 Agassiz's overtasked brain made an 

 unmistakable demand for rest. He was withdrawn entirely 

 from mental occupation for the whole of the following winter, 

 and spent a period of convalescence at Deerfield, Mass., in the 

 next spring. Agassiz was then sixty-two years old. He had had 

 his periods of sickness before, but no such peremptory check 

 as this. Late in 1870 he returned to his work, and his recovery 

 of health seemed to be so complete that Prof. Benjamin Pierce, 

 then Superintendent of the Coast Survey, ventured to write 

 him, in the February following, " I am going to send a new iron 

 surveying steamer round to California in the course of the 

 summer. She will probably start at the end of June. Would 

 you go in her and do deep-sea dredging all the way round ? 

 If so, what companions will you take?" Agassiz went, taking 

 as companions Count de Pourtales, who had been associated 

 with him in many such researches, Dr. Franz Steidachner, of 

 the museum staff, and Mr. Blake, a student at the museum. 

 Mrs. Agassiz was also of the party. The steamer was the 

 Hassler. Owing to various delays it did not sail until Decem- 

 ber 4, 1871. The season and defects in the vessel's machinery 

 and equipments compelled a reduction of the contemplated 

 operations, yet the trip was profitable and extremely pleasant. 

 Reaching San Francisco in August, 1872, Agassiz was back in 

 Cambridge two months later. 



During his absence some of his younger scientific associates 

 had formed an educational plan which they felt sure needed 

 only Agassiz to be a success. This was for a school of natural 

 history at the seashore during the summer months, in which 

 teachers from our schools and colleges could make their vaca- 

 tions serve both for recreation and for study from the open 

 book of Nature. Although no facilities or means for the un- 

 dertaking were in sight, Agassiz entered heartily into the 

 scheme. An appeal which he made to the Legislature of Mas- 

 sachusetts in its behalf the following spring was read in a news- 

 paper by Mr. John Anderson, of New York, who had acquired 

 wealth in the tobacco business. Mr. Anderson at once offered 

 as a site for the school the island of Penikese, off the southern 

 shore of Massachusetts, at the entrance of Buzzard's Bay, to- 

 gether with the furnished dwelling and barn upon it. Scarcely 



