Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence Part 31

Aga.s.siz returned to Cambridge to find the Museum on an improved footing financially. The Legislature had given seventy-five thousand dollars for an addition to the building, and private subscriptions had doubled this sum, in order to provide for the preservation and arrangement of the new collections. In acknowledging this gift of the Legislature in his Museum Report for 1868 Aga.s.siz says:--

"While I rejoice in the prospect of this new building, as affording the means for a complete exhibition of the specimens now stored in our cellars and attics and enc.u.mbering every room of the present edifice, I yet can hardly look forward to the time when we shall be in possession of it without shrinking from the grandeur of our undertaking. The past history of our science rises before me with its lessons. Thinking men in every part of the world have been stimulated to grapple with the infinite variety of problems, connected with the countless animals scattered without apparent order throughout sea and land. They have been led to discover the affinities of various living beings. The past has yielded up its secrets, and has shown them that the animals now peopling the earth are but the successors of countless populations which have preceded them, and whose remains are buried in the crust of our globe.

Further study has revealed relations between the animals of past time and those now living, and between the law of succession in the former and the laws of growth and distribution in the latter, so intimate and comprehensive that this labyrinth of organic life a.s.sumes the character of a connected history, which opens before us with greater clearness in proportion as our knowledge increases.

But when the museums of the Old World were founded, these relations were not even suspected. The collections of natural history, gathered at immense expense in the great centres of human civilization, were acc.u.mulated mainly as an evidence of man's knowledge and skill in exhibiting to the best advantage, not only the animals, but the products and curiosities of all sorts from various parts of the world. While we admire and emulate the industry and perseverance of the men who collected these materials, and did in the best way the work it was possible to do in their time for science, we have no longer the right to build museums after this fas.h.i.+on. The originality and vigor of one generation become the subservience and indolence of the next, if we only repeat the work of our predecessors. They prepared the ground for us by acc.u.mulating the materials for extensive comparison and research. They presented the problem; we ought to be ready with the solution. If I mistake not, the great object of our museums should be to exhibit the whole animal kingdom as a manifestation of the Supreme Intellect. Scientific investigation in our day should be inspired by a purpose as animating to the general sympathy, as was the religious zeal which built the Cathedral of Cologne or the Basilica of St. Peter's. The time is pa.s.sed when men expressed their deepest convictions by these wonderful and beautiful religious edifices; but it is my hope to see, with the progress of intellectual culture, a structure arise among us which may be a temple of the revelations written in the material universe. If this be so, our buildings for such an object can never be too comprehensive, for they are to embrace the infinite work of Infinite Wisdom. They can never be too costly, so far as cost secures permanence and solidity, for they are to contain the most instructive doc.u.ments of Omnipotence."

Aga.s.siz gave the winter of 1869 to identifying, cla.s.sifying, and distributing the new collections. A few weeks in the spring were, however, pa.s.sed with his friend Count de Pourtales in a dredging expedition on board the Coast Survey Steamer Bibb, off the coast of Cuba, on the Bahama Banks, and among the reefs of Florida. This dredging excursion, though it covered a wider ground than any previous one, was the third deep-sea exploration undertaken by M.

de Pourtales under the auspices of the Coast Survey. His investigations may truly be said to have exercised a powerful influence upon this line of research, and to have led the way to the more extended work of the same kind carried on by the Coast Survey in later years. He had long wished to show his old friend and teacher some of the rich dredging grounds he had discovered between Florida and the West Indies, and they thoroughly enjoyed this short period of work together. Every day and hour brought some new interest, and excess of material seemed the only difficulty.

This was Aga.s.siz's last cruise in the Bibb, on whose hospitable deck he had been a welcome guest from the first year of his arrival in this country. The results of this expedition, as connected with the present conformation of the continent and its probable geological history in the past, were given as follows in the Museum Bulletin of the same year.

REPORT UPON DEEP SEA DREDGINGS.*

(* "Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology" 1 Number 13 1869 pages 368, 369.)

BY LOUIS AGa.s.sIZ.

From what I have seen of the deep-sea bottom, I am already led to infer that among the rocks forming the bulk of the stratified crust of our globe, from the oldest to the youngest formation, there are probably none which have been formed in very deep waters. If this be so, we shall have to admit that the areas now respectively occupied by our continents, as circ.u.mscribed by the two hundred fathom curve or thereabout, and the oceans at greater depth, have from the beginning retained their relative outline and position; the continents having at all times been areas of gradual upheaval with comparatively slight oscillations of rise and subsidence, and the oceans at all times areas of gradual depression with equally slight oscillations. Now that the geological const.i.tution of our continent is satisfactorily known over the greatest part of its extent, it seems to me to afford the strongest evidence that this has been the case; while there is no support whatever for the a.s.sumption that any part of it has sunk again to any very great depth after its rise above the surface of the ocean. The fact that upon the American continent, east of the Rocky Mountains, the geological formations crop out in their regular succession, from the oldest azoic and primordial deposits to the cretaceous formation, without the slightest indication of a great subsequent subsidence, seems to me the most complete and direct demonstration of my proposition. Of the western part of the continent I am not prepared to speak with the same confidence. Moreover, the position of the cretaceous and tertiary formations along the low grounds east of the Allegheny range is another indication of the permanence of the ocean trough, on the margin of which these more recent beds have been formed. I am well aware that in a comparatively recent period, portions of Canada and the United States, which now stand six or seven hundred feet above the level of the sea, have been under water; but this has not changed the configuration of the continent, if we admit that the latter is in reality circ.u.mscribed by the two hundred fathom curve of depth.

The summer was pa.s.sed in his beloved laboratory at Nahant (as it proved, the last he ever spent there), where he was still continuing the preparation of his work on sharks and skates. At the close of the summer, he interrupted this occupation for one to which he brought not only the reverence of a disciple, but a life-long debt of personal grat.i.tude and affection. He had been entreated to deliver the address at the Humboldt Centennial Celebration (September 15, 1869), organized under the auspices of the Boston Society of Natural History. He had accepted the invitation with many misgivings, for to literary work as such he was unaccustomed, and in the field of the biographer he felt himself a novice. His preparation for the task was conscientious and laborious. For weeks he shut himself up in a room of the Public Library in Boston and reviewed all the works of the great master, living, as it were, in his presence. The result was a very concise and yet full memoir, a strong and vigorous sketch of Humboldt's researches, and of their influence not only upon higher education at the present day, but on our most elementary instruction, until the very "school-boy is familiar with his methods, yet does not know that Humboldt is his teacher." Aga.s.siz's picture of this generous intellect, fertilizing whatever it touched, was made the more life-like by the side lights which his affection for Humboldt and his personal intercourse with him in the past enabled him to throw upon it. Emerson, who was present, said of this address, "that Aga.s.siz had never delivered a discourse more wise, more happy, or of more varied power." George William Curtis writes of it: "Your discourse seems to me the very ideal of such an address, --so broad, so simple, so comprehensive, so glowing, so profoundly appreciative, telling the story of Humboldt's life and work as I am sure no other living man can tell it." In memory of this occasion the "Humboldt Scholars.h.i.+p" was founded at the Museum of Comparative Zoology.

It is hardly worth while to consider now whether this effort, added to the pressing work of the year, hastened the attack which occurred soon after, with its warning to Aga.s.siz that his overtasked brain could bear no farther strain. The first seizure, of short duration, but affecting speech and motion while it lasted, was followed by others which became less and less acute until they finally disappeared. For months, however, he was shut up in his room, absolutely withdrawn from every intellectual effort, and forbidden by his physicians even to think. The fight with his own brain was his greatest difficulty, and perhaps he showed as much power in compelling his active intellect to stultify itself in absolute inactivity for the time, as he had ever shown in giving it free rein. Yet he could not always banish the Museum, the pa.s.sionate dream of his American life. One day, after dictating some necessary directions concerning it, he exclaimed, with a sort of despairing cry, "Oh, my Museum! my Museum! always uppermost, by day and by night, in health and in sickness, always--ALWAYS!"

He was destined, however, to a few more years of activity, the reward, perhaps, of his patient and persistent struggle for recovery. After a winter of absolute seclusion, pa.s.sed in his sick chamber, he was allowed by his physician, in the spring of 1870, to seek change at the quiet village of Deerfield on the Connecticut River. Nature proved the best physician. Unable when he arrived to take more than a few steps without vertigo, he could, before many weeks were over, walk several miles a day. Keen as an Egyptologist for the hieroglyphics of his science, he was soon deciphering the local inscriptions of the glacial period, tracking the course of the ice on slab and dike and river-bed,--on every natural surface.

The old music sang again in his ear and wooed him back to life.

In the mean time, his a.s.sistants and students were doing all in their power to keep the work of the Museum at high-water mark. The publications, the cla.s.sification and arrangement of the more recent collections, the distribution of such portions as were intended for the public, the system of exchanges, went on uninterruptedly. The working force at the Museum was, indeed, now very strong. In great degree it was, so to speak, home-bred. Aga.s.siz had gradually gathered about him, chiefly from among his more special students, a staff of a.s.sistants who were familiar with his plans and shared his enthusiasm. To these young friends he was warmly attached. It would be impossible to name them all, but the knot of younger men who were for years his daily a.s.sociates in scientific work, whose sympathy and cooperation he so much valued, and who are now in their turn growing old in the service of science, will read the roll-call between the lines, and know that none are forgotten here.

Years before his own death, he had the pleasure of seeing several of them called to important scientific positions, and it was a cogent evidence to him of the educational efficiency of the Museum, that it had supplied to the country so many trained investigators and teachers. Through them he himself teaches still. There was a prophecy in Lowell's memorial lines:--

"He was a Teacher: why be grieved for him Whose living word still stimulates the air?

In endless file shall loving scholars come, The glow of his transmitted touch to share."

Beside these, there were several older, experienced naturalists, who were permanently or transiently engaged at the Museum. Some were heads of departments, while others lent a.s.sistance occasionally in special work. Again the list is too long for enumeration, but as the veteran among the older men Mr. J.G.

Anthony should be remembered. Already a conchologist of forty years' standing when he came to the Museum in 1863, he devoted himself to the inst.i.tution until the day of his death, twenty years later. Among those who came to give occasional help were Mr.

Lesquereux, the head of paleontological botany in this country; M.

Jules Marcou, the geologist; and M. de Pourtales, under whose care the collection of corals was constantly improved and enlarged. The last named became at last wholly attached to the Museum, sharing its administration with Alexander Aga.s.siz after his father's death.

To this band of workers some accessions had recently been made.

More than two years before, Aga.s.siz had been so fortunate as to secure the a.s.sistance of the entomologist, Dr. Hermann Hagen, from Konigsberg, Prussia. He came at first only for a limited time, but he remained, and still remains, at the Museum, becoming more and more identified with the inst.i.tution, beside filling a place as professor in Harvard University. His scientific sympathy and support were of the greatest value to Aga.s.siz during the rest of his life. A later new-corner, and a very important one at the Museum, was Dr. Franz Steindachner, of Vienna, who arrived in the spring of 1870 to put in final order the collection of Brazilian fishes, and pa.s.sed two years in this country. Thus Aga.s.siz's hands were doubly strengthened. Beside having the service of the salaried a.s.sistants and professors, the Museum received much gratuitous aid.

Among the scientific volunteers were numbered for years Francois de Pourtales, Theodore Lyman, James M. Barnard, and Alexander Aga.s.siz, while the business affairs of the inst.i.tution were undertaken by Thomas G. Cary, Aga.s.siz's brother-in-law. The latter had long been of great service to the Museum as collector on the Pacific coast, where he had made this work his recreation in the leisure hours of a merchant's life.* (* For the history of the Museum in later times reference is made to the regular reports and publications of the inst.i.tution.)

Broken as he was in health, it is amazing to see the amount of work done or directed by Aga.s.siz during this convalescent summer of 1870. The letters written by him in this time concerning the Museum alone would fill a good-sized volume. Such a correspondence is unfit for reproduction here, but its minuteness shows that almost the position of every specimen, and the daily, hourly work of every individual in the Museum, were known to him. The details of administration form, however, but a small part of the material of this correspondence. The consideration and discussion of the future of the Museum with those most nearly concerned, fill many of the letters. They give evidence of a fostering and far-reaching care, which provided for the growth and progress of the Museum, long after his own share in it should have ceased.

In reviewing Aga.s.siz's scientific life in the United States, its brilliant successes, and the genial generous support which it received in this country, it is natural to give prominence to the brighter side. And yet it must not be forgotten that like all men whose ideals outrun the means of execution, he had moments of intense depression and discouragement. Some of his letters, written at this time to friends who controlled the financial policy of the Museum, are almost like a plea for life. While the trustees urge safe investments and the expenditure of income alone, he believes that in proportion to the growth and expansion of the Museum will be its power of self-maintenance and its claim on the community at large. In short, expenditure seemed to him the best investment, insuring a fair return, on the principle that the efficiency and usefulness of an inst.i.tution will always be the measure of the support extended to it. The two or three following letters, in answer to letters from Aga.s.siz which cannot be found, show how earnestly, in spite of physical depression, he strove to keep the Museum in relation with foreign inst.i.tutions, to strengthen the former, and cooperate as far as possible with the latter.

FROM PROFESSOR VON SIEBOLD.

MUNICH, 1869.

. . .Most gladly shall I meet your wishes both with regard to the fresh-water fishes of Central Europe and to your desire for the means of direct comparison between the fishes brought by Spix from Brazil and described by you, and those you have recently yourself collected in the Amazons. The former, with one exception, are still in existence and remain undisturbed, for since your day no one has cared to work at the fishes or reptiles. Schubert took no interest in the zoological cabinet intrusted to him; and Wagner, who later relieved him of its management, cared chiefly for the mammals. I have now, however, given particular attention to the preservation of everything determined by you, so far as it could be found, and am truly glad that this material is again to be called into the service of science. Of course I had to ask permission of the "General Conservatorium of Scientific Collections" before sending this property of the state on so long a journey. At my urgent request this permission was very cordially granted by Herr von Liebig, especially as our collection is likely to be increased by the new forms you offer us.

As to the fresh-water fishes I must beg for a little time. At the fish market, in April or May, I can find those Cyprinoids, the males of which bear at the sp.a.w.ning season that characteristic eruption of the skin, which has so often and so incorrectly led to the making of new species. . .

From your son Alexander I receive one beautiful work after another.

Give him my best thanks for these admirable gifts, which I enter with sincere pleasure in my catalogue of books. You are indeed happy to have such a co-worker at your side. At the next opportunity I shall write my thanks to him personally.

How is Dr. Hermann Hagen pleased with his new position? I think the presence of this superior entomologist will exert a powerful and important influence upon the development of entomology in North America. . .

FROM PROFESSOR G.P. DESHAYES.

MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, PARIS, February 4, 1870.

Your letter was truly an event, my dear friend, not only for me but for our Museum. . .How happy you are, and how enviable has been your scientific career, since you have had your home in free America! The founder of a magnificent inst.i.tution, to which your glorious name will forever remain attached, you have the means of carrying out whatever undertaking commends itself to you as useful.

Men and things, following the current that sets toward you, are drawn to your side. You desire, and you see your desires carried out. You are the sovereign leader of the scientific movement around you, of which you yourself have been the first promoter.

What would our old Museum not have gained in having at its head a man like you! We should not now be lying stagnant in a s.p.a.ce so insufficient that our buildings, by the mere force of circ.u.mstances, are transformed into store-houses, where objects of study are heaped together, and can be of no use to any one. . .You can fancy how much I envy your organization. It depressed me to read your letter, with its brilliant proposals of exchange, remembering how powerless we are to meet even a small number of them. Your project is certainly an admirable one; to find the scientific nomenclature where it is best established, and by the help of good specimens transport it to your own doors. Nothing could be better, and I would gladly a.s.sist in it. But to succeed in this excellent enterprise one must have good duplicate specimens; not having them, one must have money. As a conclusion to your letter, the question of money was brought before my a.s.sembled colleagues, but the answer was vague and uncertain. I must, then, find resources in some other way, and this is what I propose to do . . .[Here follow some plans for exchange.] Beside this, I will busy myself in getting together authentic collections from our French seas, both Oceanic and Mediterranean, and even from other points in the European seas. Meantime, you shall have your share henceforth in whatever comes to me. . .I learn from your son that your health is seriously attacked. I was grieved to hear it. Take care of yourself, my dear friend. You are still needed in this world; you have a great work to accomplish, the end and aim of which you alone are able to reach. You must, therefore, still stand in the breach for some years to come.

Your letter, which shows me the countless riches you have to offer at the Museum, puts me in the frame of mind of the child who was offered his choice in a toy-shop. "I choose everything," he said. I could reply in the same way. I choose all you offer me. Still, one must be reasonable, and I will therefore name, as the thing I chiefly desire, the remarkable fauna dredged from the Gulf Stream.

Let me add, however, in order to give you entire freedom, that whatever you may send to the Museum will be received with sincere and ardent grat.i.tude.

And so, farewell, my dear friend, with a warm shake of the hand and the most cordial regard.

DESHAYES.

The next is in answer to a letter from Aga.s.siz to the veteran naturalist, Professor Sedgwick, concerning casts of well-known fossil specimens in Cambridge, England. Though the casts were unattainable, the affectionate reply gave Aga.s.siz keen pleasure.

FROM PROFESSOR ADAM SEDGWICK.

THE CLOSE, NORWICH, August 9, 1871.

MY VERY DEAR AND HONORED FRIEND,

. . .I of course showed your letter to my friend Seeley, and after some consultation with men of practical knowledge, it was considered almost impossible to obtain such casts of the reptilian bones as you mention. The specimens of the bones are generally so rugged and broken, that the artists would find it extremely difficult to make casts from them without the risk of damaging them, and the authorities of the university, who are the proprietors of the whole collection in my Museum, would be unwilling to encounter that risk. Mr. Seeley, however, fully intends to send you a gutta-percha cast of the cerebral cavity of one of our important specimens described in "Seeley's Catalogue,"

but he is full of engagements and may not hitherto have realized his intentions. As for myself, at present I can do nothing except hobble daily on my stick from my house to the Cathedral, for I am afflicted by a painful lameness in my left knee. The load of years begins to press upon me (I am now toiling through my 87th year), and my sight is both dim and irritable, so that, as a matter of necessity, I am generally compelled to employ an amanuensis. That part is now filled by a niece who is to me in the place of a dear daughter.

I need not tell you that the meetings of the British a.s.sociation are still continued, and the last session (this year at Edinburgh) only ended yesterday. Let me correct a mistake. I met you first at Edinburgh in 1834, the year I became Canon, and again at Dublin in 1835. . .It is a great pleasure to me, my dear friend, to see again by the vision of memory that fine youthful person, that benevolent face, and to hear again, as it were, the cheerful ring of the sweet and powerful voice by which you made the old Scotchmen start and stare, while you were bringing to life again the fishes of their old red sandstone. I must be content with the visions of memory and the feelings they again kindle in my heart, for it will never be my happiness to see your face again in this world. But let me, as a Christian man, hope that we may meet hereafter in heaven, and see such visions of G.o.d's glory in the moral and material universe, as shall reduce to a mere germ everything which has been elaborated by the skill of man, or revealed to G.o.d's creatures. I send you an old man's blessing, and remain,

Your affectionate friend,

ADAM SEDGWICK.

In November, 1870, Aga.s.siz was able to return to Cambridge and the Museum, and even to resume his lectures, which were as vigorous and fresh as ever. So entirely did he seem to have recovered, that in the course of the winter the following proposition was made to him by his friend, Professor Benjamin Peirce, then Superintendent of the Coast Survey.

FROM PROFESSOR PEIRCE.

COAST SURVEY OFFICE, WAs.h.i.+NGTON, February 18, 1871.

. . .I met Sumner in the Senate the day before yesterday, and he expressed immense delight at a letter he had received from Brown-Sequard, telling him that you were altogether free from disease. . .Now, my dear friend, I have a very serious proposition for you. I am going to send a new iron surveying steamer round to California in the course of the summer. She will probably start at the end of June. Would you go in her, and do deep-sea dredging all the way round? If so, what companions will you take? If not, who shall go?. . .