ALEXANDER AGASSIZ 423 
tologist, which were not used by his father, and he confined himself to 
the study of living animals whenever this was possible. Thus it is that 
he ranks among the foremost of those systematists and embryologists who 
have devoted themselves to the observation of marine animals, but his- 
tology was wholly neglected by him. Nor did he ever take part in that 
stirring discussion of Darwinism which engrossed the attention of all 
of his contemporaries. It would be unfair to say that he did not believe 
in evolution, but the truth is that he was but little interested in the 
speculative side of science, excepting in so far as its deductions could 
be based upon observations of facts. In later life he came to regard the 
labors of the physiologist and of the laboratory experimenters upon the 
reactions of animals as beyond the scope of zoology. 
But the walls of the museum and problems of zoology were too nar- 
row a bound for such a genius of activity as Alexander Agassiz; more- 
over, he was poor and he required funds for the prosecution and publica- 
tion of his work in science and thus in 1865 he engaged in coal mining 
in Pennsylvania, and in the following year he temporarily left the 
museum and became superintendent of the then unprofitable Calumet 
copper mine on the southern shore of Lake Superior, and in 1867 he 
united the Calumet with the adjacent Hecla mine, calling the combined 
property the Calumet and Hecla. It is due more to him than to any 
other man that this mine has produced the largest profits ever divided 
by any incorporated mining company, for the dividends up to December 
31, 1907, amounted to $105,850,000. From the first days of his leader- 
ship in its affairs the company excelled all other mines in the introduc- 
tion of heavy machinery and modern methods. Indeed its life depended 
upon the development of methods of mining upon a large scale, and so 
vastly has it grown that 83,863,116 pounds of fine copper were produced 
in 1907. As superintendent and director and afterwards as president 
of the company Alexander Agassiz steadily pursued the policy which led 
to this extraordinary industrial success, and out of the wealth it brought 
him he devoted upward of $1,000,000 to forwarding the aims of the 
museum which his father had founded, until he made it famous 
throughout the world for its excellent publications in science. He also 
expended large sums upon numerous scientific expeditions, the results 
of which he published in a manner that has never been excelled. 
To have developed the greatest copper mine in the world would have 
taxed the entire energy of many an able man, but so extraordinary was 
Alexander Agassiz’s capacity for productive labor that he became the 
sole author of 127 notable scientific works, many of them large books 
with numerous plates and illustrations drawn by himself, and he pub- 
lished many other minor papers. He was also the joint author of 18 
and the patron or inspirer of more than 100 more which were written 
by specialists in America, Europe and Japan to whom he sent the collec- 
tions he had gathered. 
