22 ALEXANDER AGASSIZ 



not graduating higher than twenty-fourth in a class of 

 eighty-two. 



He pulled bow on the University Crew, at about one 

 hundred and forty pounds, a position that he also filled 

 while in the Scientific School. Rowing was managed in 

 a simpler way in those days, when the only distinction 

 between an amateur and a professional was, that one 

 was a gentleman who rowed for pleasure, and the other 

 an individual who did so as a business. It is refreshing 

 to learn that the members of the University Crew of 

 the day bought, out of their own pockets, the first 

 racing-shell ever seen at Harvard. 1 On its arrival in 

 Boston, they carried it across the city on their shoulders, 

 and reimbursed themselves from the prize which they 

 won, from the best professionals of the day, at the next 

 regatta on the Charles. 



This crew, by the way, made crimson the Harvard 

 badge. In order that it might be more easily recognized, 

 one of its members, Charles W. Eliot, the future Presi- 

 dent of the University, bought some crimson handker- 

 chiefs in Boston. These the oarsmen bound on their 

 heads, thus establishing the college color. 



Agassiz retained his interest in rowing all through 

 life ; even in his last years he could judge a crew at 

 a glance and pick out its weak points with singular 

 accuracy and swiftness. Occasionally he would appear at 

 the Museum so hoarse that he could scarcely speak; 

 then some one was sure to ask him how he caught such 

 a bad cold. An expression of shyness and sheepishness 

 would steal over his face, and he would explain that 

 he had been to a boat-race and fancied he must have 

 shouted rather too loud. 



1 The bow of this boat now hangs in the west room of the Harvard Union. 



