No. 375.] AGASSIZ ON RECENT FISHES. 175 
play a very large part in the history of the systematic zoology 
of North America. 
One of the most important of these was a critical study of 
the fauna of the Tennessee River, published in 1854, and based 
chiefly on collections made by Mr. Newman at Huntsville, Ala. 
In this paper he discussed certain problems of the distribution 
of fresh waters and indicated new ones. If he had answered 
these by inductive observation, he would have been led, as his 
students have been, at once into the belief in the transmutation 
of species. 
In 1855 a collection of fishes from the western parts of the 
United States led him to a consideration in detail of the proper 
classification of our fresh-water fishes. Most of the many 
genera here proposed by him have stood the test of time, but 
in a few cases the true relation of forms was not fully under- 
stood. At about the same time, Dr. A. C. Jackson, of San 
Diego, called the attention of Professor Agassiz to the group of 
viviparous surf fishes (Embiotocidze) which constitutes the most 
remarkable feature of the fish fauna of California. Agassiz 
took up the study of this group, described many of its genera 
and species, and gave an interesting account of its remarkable 
anatomical features. At almost the same time the same 
peculiarities were independently studied by Dr. W. O. Gibbons, 
of Alameda, and by Dr. Charles Girard, of the Smithsonian 
Institution, himself one of Agassiz’s students. Agassiz’s papers 
have priority of date, and the generic names given by him, 
especially the type name of Embiotoca, this word an inspiration 
in itself, are in general the ones to be retained. 
After 1855 no papers of importance relating to fishes were 
published under Agassiz’s own name. We find the influence 
of his views and example in the work of his students, notably 
Girard, Putnam, and Garman, as well as in that of Baird, Storer, 
and others who were indebted to him in one way or another 
for assistance. 
Concerning the vast wealth of his Brazilian and other South 
American collections, Agassiz has written little. The basement 
of the museum at Cambridge is still crowded with unstudied 
material collected by Agassiz. Much of this material has been 
