LOUIS AGASSIZ 91 



as the counting-house, and the library as 

 well as either. The Civil War was still 

 but a distant growling, and yet threat- 

 ening enough to stimulate the grim Puri- 

 tan blood, which seems to do best under 

 indignation. The land was pullulent 

 with poets, artists, and sages, of whom 

 no inconsiderable number really came 

 to some accomplishment. 



The better part of this activity was 

 literary, not scientific. But men of let- 

 ters always recognised Agassiz as one of 

 their own kind, and he found his niche in 

 any intellectual society. It is to Agassiz 

 the man, the brilliant and bewitching 

 companion, the charming and affection- 

 ate friend, the lover of fun as well 

 as of wit and wisdom, and to Agassiz 

 the inspired teacher of breathless au- 

 diences, more than to Agassiz the 

 learned ichthyologist and geologist, that 

 we find constant reference. Emerson 

 and Longfellow, Holmes and Lowell, 

 are the names with which his is asso- 



