332 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. YL, No. 141. 



investigations on fossil echinoderms and mollusks, 

 — all requiring the most careful illustrations. His 

 researches upon glaciers also occupied a great deal 

 of his thought and time between 1836 and 1846. 

 Desor cooperated with him, and so did Arnold 

 Guyot, the acquaintance of his boyhood, the col- 

 league of his middle life, and the friend of his ad- 

 vancing years. In the winter of 1840 the ' Etudes 

 sur les glaciers ' were prepared for pubhcation. 

 The memoir introduces the fascinating story of the 

 ' Hotel des Neuchatelois,' and the observations of 

 Agassiz, Guyot, Desor, Vogt, Pourtales, Nicolet, 

 Coulon and others, and it closes with an account 

 of the ascent of the Jungfrau, by Agassiz, with his 

 iive friends and six guides. 



About the year 1842, the thoughts of Agassiz 

 turned toward the United States as a region to be 

 studied. Charles Bonaparte, Prince of Canino, 

 was expecting to make the journey and desired 

 to secure his company ; but the plan fell through, 

 and in the following spring Agassiz raised this 

 significant question ; ' ' Do you think any position 

 would be open to me in the United States where I 

 might earn enough to enable me to continue the 

 publication of my unhappy books, which never 

 pay their way because they do not meet the wants 

 of the world?" Two years later the king of 

 Prussia granted liim 15,000 francs for his journey. 

 He sailed for America in September, 1846. Little 

 did he or liis friends suppose that he was to make 

 a i^ermanent home in America. ' ' So closed tliis 

 period of Agassiz's life. The next was to open in 

 new scenes and under wholly different condi- 

 tions," to which the second volume introduces 

 us. 



We have purposely devoted the most of our 

 space to the European portion of tliis memoir, 

 because the later years of Agassiz's life are so fa- 

 miliar to American readers. We now tm-n to the 

 second volume, wliich exhibits the same editorial 

 tact, the same skilful selection and presentation 

 of materials, as the fii*st, and doubtless to many 

 readers it will be more entertaining. 



Agassiz first came before the public in tliis 

 country when he deUvered a course of lectures at 

 the Lowell institute. The memou' gives a long 

 letter which he addi*essed to his mother in Decem- 

 ber, conveying liis impressions of American 

 science and American scientific men, and particu- 

 larly his observations on a journey from Boston 

 to Washington. Silliman, Dana, Shepard, Gray, 

 Redfield, ToiTey, Morton, Lea, Haldeman, 

 Bache, Bailey, Band, LeConte, are among 

 the familiar names of those whom he met in 

 travel. iVnother familiar letter to Milue- 

 Edwards gives his impressions of other men 

 and other phases of scientific activity. To EHe de 



Beaumont he writes of the glacial drift in New 

 England, a problem which always arrested the at- 

 tention of his practised eye. To oceanic studies 

 he was introduced by the opportunities afforded 

 him on the steamer Bibb, of the U. S. coast survey, 

 through the enlightened invitation of Dr. Bache 

 and Captain Davis. "Here," says the biographer, 

 "was another determining motive for his stay 

 iQ tliis country. Under no other government, 

 perhaps, could he have had opportunities so in- 

 valuable to a naturalist." 



The political revolution of 1848, which released 

 Neuf chatel from the sovereignty of Prussia, released 

 Agassiz from the service of the King of Prussia, 

 and made him free to accept the overtures of a 

 professorship in the Lawrence scientific school of 

 Harvard college, then about to be estabhshed, 

 where he was guaranteed a salary of fifteeii 

 hundred dollars, until the fees of the students 

 should be worth twice that, a period ' which never 

 came.' The memoir gives a delightful picture of 

 the society of Cambridge in those days, and of the 

 household arrangements, over which an old Swiss 

 friend, ' Papa Christinat,' presided. Then began, 

 '' in an old wooden shanty set on piles,' which 

 might have served as a bathing or boat house, 

 that museum which has grow^n by the united 

 labors and the devotion of father and son, to be 

 the great Museum of comparative zoology in Cam- 

 bridge. His second marriage took place in 1850, 

 and from that time on Agassiz was identified 

 with the United States. No offers, however 

 tempting, could induce him to give up the delight- 

 ful cu'cle to which he was bound in Cambridge 

 and Boston. 



His scientific journeys to Florida, to Lake Supe- 

 rior, to Brazil, and finally around Cape Horn to Cal- 

 ifornia, are so weU known to naturahsts that we 

 only aUude to them. His participation in scientific 

 assemblies ; his interest in science-teaching in 

 common schools ; his power in developing the 

 school of naturalists now leading in so many 

 branches of science throughout this country ; his 

 attractiveness as a public lecturer ; his magnetism 

 as a collector ; his wonderful beginning of the 

 ' Contributions to natural history ; ' his hearty 

 friendship ; his devotion to his adopted land ; his 

 desire to contribute in every way to the good of 

 the public ; — all these characteristics are so fresh 

 in the recollection of Americans that they will 

 turn with great dehglit to the pages in which 

 the details are beautifully brought out. 



These volumes deserve to be read by all who are 

 interested in the development of a noble and 

 completed hfe, which was marked, as the bio- 

 grapher says, by rare coherence and unity of 

 aim. 



