78 SEQUEL OF AGASSIZ'S SCHOOL AT PENIKESE. 



barrier to the southward extension of northern forms, and to the north- 

 ward travel of those animals whose home is in the southern seas. 



The naturalist, then, who would study to greatest advantage the pe- 

 lagic life of our part of the Atlantic must go south of Cape Cod ; and 

 if he proposes to remain in New England, he is practically restricted to 

 the months of Buzzard's and Narraganset bays, since the coast of Long 

 Island affords few advantages for his pursuit, and the Sound is too land- 

 locked. It was with an appreciation of these facts that the late Pro- 

 fessor Louis Agassiz fixed upon Penikese Island, near New Bedford, Mas- 

 sachusetts, as the site of his Summer School of Natural History ; and the 

 profusion of species of marine animals and plants procured there proved 

 his wisdom, so far as the question of locality was concerned. "When Pro- 

 fessor Agassiz died, however, and his son and successor at the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology in Cambridge, Mr. Alexander Agassiz, undertook to 

 continue the enterprise and pursue his own investigations at the same 

 locality, lie met with difficulties. 



It was discovered that, owing to inaccessibility and other circum- 

 stances, the expense of continuing the school would be too great to make 

 it profitable in any sense, and that the oversight of so large a class in- 

 volved a greater tax upon his time than Mr. Agassiz could afford. The 

 school was therefore closed, and a position was sought which should be 

 equally rich in material for study, but more convenient for the erection 

 of such a laboratory as is about to be described — a laboratory which 

 should not attempt to carry out the widely educational idea of the elder 

 professor, but should simply be the best desirable workshop for Mr. Agas- 

 siz and such of his assistants and advanced special students at the Cam- 

 bridge Museum as he could find accommodation for. These facts are 

 plainly stated in order to dispel a current error that the present institu- 

 tion is only a weak perpetuation of Professor Louis Agassiz's school at 

 Penikese in 1873. 



After very careful examination, the terminus of the Neck, at New- 

 port, Ehode Island, was fixed upon by Mr. Agassiz as the most suitable 

 location. Here a promontory of solid rock, well clothed with turf, stands 

 out boldly from the coast-line. With the open ocean westward and in 

 front as you look towards the south, and the entrance to the harbor, 

 divided by Conanicnt and other islands from the shining breadth of 

 Narraganset Bay, beside you on the right, few points on our coast or any 

 other give a more inspiring outlook. In 1812 some defensive earthworks 

 crowned the bluff, giving the name Castle Hill to the promonto*y, the 

 crest of which is now occupied by Mr. Agassiz's summer home. On the 



