CHAPTER VII 



I BECOME AGASSIZ'S PUPIL AT HABVABD 



IN 1858, when I was seventeen years old, it was determined that 

 I should have a good education. My parents could well afford 

 this, for my grandfather had left considerable property and be- 

 sides that there were other means. The plan was that I should 

 have a liberal training, and then make up my mind as to what 

 profession I would adopt. It was at first proposed that I should 

 go to West Point, but my fancy for war had passed, and not 

 even the argument that there was war to come, and that soon, 

 affected me. My desire, moved by my teacher Escher, was to 

 go to Heidelberg; fortunately it was determined that I should 

 begin my exploration of the realm of higher learning at Har- 

 vard College. We supposed that I was far enough along to 

 enter the sophomore class in 1859, and after graduating that 

 I would go to Germany for further study. For my own part, 

 I cared little where I went or what I did. There was need of 

 enlargement, the resources about me were used up, and I was 

 so shaped that if a change had not been made, I should have 

 wandered away in search of adventures. 



My father went with me to Cambridge, and as it was well on 

 in the first term, I was placed under a tutor recommended by 

 his classmate, Dixwell. I was then a lank fellow, six feet high, 

 very slender, nimble from a good though limited physical train- 

 ing, still rather feeble from attacks of malaria and megrims. 

 As for my training, what has been said before shows that it was 

 from the schoolmaster's point of view a jumble of unrelated 

 matters, a very poor basis for collegiate study, which took 

 no account of a training in arms and equitation, and as little 

 of philosophy and geology or a knowledge of human nature. 



