1872-82 LETTER FROM O. W. HOLMES 237 
slight, my museum in that department consist- 
ing of a single trilobite given me by Professor 
Gray the botanist, and which I keep before 
my eyes (mounted in the form of a paper-weight) 
to make the aete^'nitas a parte ante in some 
measure palpable to my apprehension, and to cool 
]33y egoism when it gets too warm with exercise 
and needs to be reminded that its subject is one 
in a long procession. But I have been a lecturer 
on human anatomy for more than thirty years, 
and so can understand your paper® and see its 
interest, for, without having made an express 
study of comparative anatomy, I have necessarily 
rubbed against it so much and from so many 
points of view that I find myself m possession of 
a certain amount of knowledge, hardly knowing 
how I came by it. . . . I have a reminiscence 
which will call up a name well known to you. In 
the year 1834, I think it was, that I visited 
London and carried a letter to your father-in-law, 
Mr. Clift, from an old fellow-student. He received 
me very kindly, and I have a distinct recollection 
of passing an evening most agreeably at his 
house. I was for many years — that is, during his 
whole residence in America— on intimate terms of 
friendship with Louis Agassiz, being one of the 
four whom he had as associates under the name 
» ‘On the Occurrence in North England’ {Annals and Maga- 
Ametica of Rare Extinct Verte- zine of Natural History). 
brates found fragmentarily in 
