46 ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ 



health that it became necessary to find some other means 

 of adding to his resources and relieving him from a heavy 

 debt contracted for the publication of his work on fossil 

 fishes and for other scientific investigations. These perplex- 

 ities were solved by Mrs. Agassiz, who met the situation 

 with as great adaptability as Elizabeth Perkins had dis- 

 played when she was left a widow, and Samuel and Sarah 

 Gary when they lost their Grenada property. As she lay 

 awake one night anxiously turning over ways and means for 

 repairing the family purse, there suddenly flashed into her 

 mind the idea of establishing a school for girls in the upper 

 part of the Quincy Street house with the assistance of her 

 two older step-children. Quickly the scheme built itself up in 

 her ready imagination, and she no less promptly proceeded 

 to carry it out. A note to her father shows that she first 

 consulted him and then secured the cooperation of her step- 

 children. 



TO THOMAS G. GARY 



Cambridge [March, 1855] 



I FIND that Ida feels exactly as I expected about our 

 plan. It seems that the thought is not a new one to 

 any of us; we have had it in our minds under different 

 forms. I must say that the hearty pleasure with which 

 both Alex and Ida enter into the project gives me 

 new confidence in it, and I trust the end will show 

 that it was the right and wise course to take. I shall 

 be in again to-morrow to have another talk before 

 you go to New York, Your approbation and sympathy 

 about the plan have made me really strong, and in- 

 deed if you had not listened to it so promptly, I should 

 never have dared to propose it to any one else. 



