324 ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ 



The proposal of the Associates that she become Honor- 

 ary President was accepted by Mrs. Agassiz, and her resig- 

 nation from her active duties, which devolved in large 

 measure upon Miss Irwin, made no difference in the regu- 

 lar order of affairs at the college. At the Commencement 

 exercises of 1900 Professor W. W. Goodwin delivered the 

 address. "It closed," Mrs. Agassiz writes in her diary, 

 "with a few words of affectionate remembrance of my per- 

 sonal relation to the college which were very touching to 

 me as coming from such an old friend." These were the 

 "few words": 



During our academic life of twenty-one years 

 we have had the high privilege of being under the 

 leadership of the gracious lady who now lays down 

 the active work of the presidency. From the beginning 

 Mrs. Agassiz has been at once our chief guide and 

 the life and soul of our undertaking. Full of the 

 enthusiasm of her earlier years, enthusiasm which 

 was inspired from no ordinary source, she has brought 

 to us the treasured traditions of the past, and wisely 

 taught us how to use them for the inspiration of the 

 present and the future. Herself trained as a scholar 

 and a teacher, she could always give us the best 

 advice as to what we should do for the higher ed- 

 ucation of women and what we should not do. It is 

 to her influence as much as to anything that our suc- 

 cess and our present position in the academic world 

 are due. In our private deliberations and also in the 

 critical times when we needed a wise and dignified 

 representative in public, we have always felt her 

 steady hand at the helm. I feel that no words can 



