CHAPTER XIX 



1904-1910 



EASTERN PACIFIC EXPEDITION 



Now that he had visited all the principal coral regions 

 of the world, Agassiz planned to return to the more 

 purely biological investigations, to which he had de- 

 voted his attention in his cruises on the Blake, and 

 on the first Albatross Expedition in 1891. Wishing to 

 inquire further into the conditions existing in the regions 

 of the ocean far from land, he selected for his next voy- 

 age an almost unknown portion of the surface of the 

 world, the Eastern Tropical Pacific. This vast expanse 

 of water stretches from the South American coast to 

 Manga Reva, or Gambier, the southeastern extension 

 of the Paumotus. It is broken only by Easter Island, 

 and offers a better opportunity for the study of the 

 open ocean than anywhere else on the surface of the 

 globe. 



In 1904, he again obtained the Albatross, for the 

 third and last time. In preparation for the voyage the 

 equipment was thoroughly overhauled, and a Lucas 

 sounding machine substituted for the Sigsbee, which 

 had not proved entirely satisfactory on the 1899-1900 

 Expedition. 



The problem of a sufficient coal supply, a most diffi- 

 cult one in those out-of-the-way regions, Agassiz finally 

 solved by chartering, in Sydney, the Tagliaf erro, a steamer 

 considerably larger than the Albatross. Arrangements 

 were made that the boat should proceed with a cargo of 



