— 26 — 



details, the earth and its inhabitants have been brought out of 

 chaos and formless matter. I will go a step farther. Agassiz 

 and Darwin were not personally hostile. Early in 1871 the 

 former wrote me as follows: "I have read both volumes of 

 Darwin's 'Descent of Man,' which he sent himself, with a few 

 very pleasant words. You know that we are truly friends, much 

 as we differ in views." Without abating a jot of my reverence for 

 him to whom I owe so much, I like to think that now, in that 

 other life, in that better world where all clouds have passed away, 

 Agassiz and Darwin are at one in belief as to the methods of crea- 

 tion, as they were united here in searching after truth. 



Weighted from an early age with labors and cares which over- 

 taxed even his great powers of body and mind, the tenderer-side of 

 Agassiz' nature was not seen by all. A single incident may show 

 the readiness with which it could assert itself. For a certain piece 

 of work an elderly German artist had come to Cambridge, leaving 

 a large family in a western city. When his absence promised to 

 be longer than at first anticipated, to relieve his loneliness, the old 

 man sent for one of his children, a lad of ten. Supplied with 

 credentials of various kinds, the boy reached Cambridge, and was 

 directed to the house of "Herr Professor." It was after dark, and 

 Agassiz sorely needed rest, after a long day at the museum. 

 Yet — instead of sending a servant as some would have done — he 

 did not hesitate to take the child by the hand, walk several 

 squares, and deliver him to the anxious father. 



Did time allow, I would gladly speak, as might a son of a noble 

 and loving parent, concerning other features of Agassiz' many-sided 

 character as they were unfolded to me, especially after the summer of 

 1866, in somewhat intimate relations which were never for a moment 

 marred by disagreement or loss of mutual confidence. Let me 

 close by reading a passage from his Humboldt Address* which not 

 only contains the key-note of his own life-purpose, but also ac~ 

 cords with the views and action of our president : f 



^Address delivered on the Centennial Anniversary of the birth of 

 Alexander von Humboldt, under the auspices of the Boston Society 

 of Natural History, September 14, 1869. 



tThe Message of the Nineteenth Century to the Twentieth. An Ad- 

 dress before the class of 1853, Yale College, June 26, 1SS3. The Irving 

 Literary Bureau, I, No. 28. 



