1866.] SENATE— No. 67. 5 



with the journeys of his predecessors on the same field with 

 the slow, sure-footed mule. 



Professor Agassiz has delivered lectures in Rio to larger 

 audiences than he ever before attracted. He writes : " Natural- 

 ists will be surprised at the revelations I am about to make 

 concerning the extraordinary variety of animal life in the 

 waters of the Amazon. We have been accustomed, for instance, 

 to consider one hundred species as the probable maximum num- 

 ber of fishes living in any of the great streams of the world ; 

 there are not so many known from the Nile, the Ganges, or the 

 Mississippi. The discovery of about fifteen hundred species of 

 fishes in this vast fresh water basin was as unexpected to me, 

 as would be the discovery of a large inland commerce in the 

 interior of Africa carried on by steam navigation. " 



In conclusion, I present copies of the Orders passed by the 

 Trustees : 



Ordered, That the grateful acknowledgments of this Board be offered 

 by the President to Nathaniel Thayer, Esq., for his munificent, kind, 

 and well-considered arrangements, enabling Professor Louis Agassiz, in 

 the way he most desires, and in the most efficient manner, to serve the 

 interests of the Museum, and the cause of science, during his present 

 absence in South America. 



Ordered, That the grateful acknowledgments of this Board be pre- 

 sented to the Pacific Mail Steam-ship Company, to their agent, Mr. 

 Allan McLane, and to Mr. George Bradbury, captain of their good ship 

 the Colorado, for the free passage and excellent facilities of all kinds 

 furnished by them to Professor Louis Agassiz and his associates on their 

 voyage from New York to Rio de Janeiro, undertaken for scientific 

 purposes connected with the Museum of Comparative Zoology, at 

 Cambridge, Massachusetts. 



Ordered, That his excellency John A. Andrew, governor of this 

 Commonwealth, being ex officio President of this Board of Trustees of 

 the Museum of Comparative Zoology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, do 

 present to his majesty Don Pedro the Second, Emperor of Brazil, the 

 grateful acknowledgments of the Trustees for the important contribu- 

 tions made by his imperial majesty to the resources of the institution 

 under their care, and for the important countenance and kindness he has 

 shown to Professor Louis Agassiz and his assistants now travelling in 



