Chapter 22: 1868-1871: Aet. 61-64.
- New subscription to Museum. -- additional buildings. -- arrangement of New collections. -- dredging expedition on board the Bibb. -- address at the Humboldt Centennial. -- attack on the brain. -- Suspension of work. -- working force at the Museum. -- New accessions.-letter from Professor Sedgwick. -- letter from Professor Deshayes. -- restored health. -- Hassler voyage proposed. -- acceptance. -- scientific preparation for the voyage.
Agassiz 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 Agassiz 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 encumbering every room of the present edifice, I yet [669] 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 assumes 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 [670] expense in the great centres of human civilization, were accumulated 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 fashion. 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 accumulating 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 passed when men expressed their deepest convictions by these [671] 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 documents of Omnipotence.’ Agassiz gave the winter of 1869 to identifying, classifying, and distributing the new collections. A few weeks in the spring were, however, passed 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 [672] 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 Agassiz'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.
The summer was passed 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 gratitude 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 [675] 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.’ Agassiz'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 Agassiz 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.’ [676] In memory of this occasion the ‘Humboldt Scholarship’ 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 Agassiz 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 passionate 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!’ [677] 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, passed 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 assistants and students were doing all in their power to keep the work of the Museum at high-water mark. The publications, the classification 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. [678] Agassiz had gradually gathered about him, chiefly from among his more special students, a staff of assistants 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 associates 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 himBeside these, there were several older, experienced naturalists, who were permanently or transiently engaged at the Museum. Some [679] were heads of departments, while others lent assistance 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 institution 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 Agassiz after his father's death. To this band of workers some accessions had recently been made. More than two years before, Agassiz had been so fortunate as to secure the assistance 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 institution, beside filling a place as professor in Harvard University. His scientific [680] sympathy and support were of the greatest value to Agassiz during the rest of his life. A later new-comer, 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 passed two years in this country. Thus Agassiz's hands were doubly strengthened. Beside having the service of the salaried assistants 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 Agassiz, while the business affairs of the institution were undertaken by Thomas G. Cary, Agassiz'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.2 Broken as he was in health, it is amazing to see the amount of work done or directed by Agassiz during this convalescent summer of 1870. The letters written by him in this [681] 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 Agassiz'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 [682] proportion to the growth and expansion of the Museum will be its power of selfmain-tenance 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 institution will always be the measure of the support extended to it. The two or three following letters, in answer to letters from Agassiz which cannot be found, show how earnestly, in spite of physical depression, he strove to keep the Museum in relation with foreign institutions, to strengthen the former, and cooperate as far as possible with the latter.
Whose living word still stimulates the air?
In endless file shall loving scholars come,
The glow of his transmitted touch to share.
The next is in answer to a letter from [687] Agassiz 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 Agassiz keen pleasure.
In November, 1870, Agassiz 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.
After consultation with his physicians, it was decided that Agassiz might safely undertake the voyage in the Hassler, that it might indeed be of benefit to his health. His party of naturalists, as finally made up, consisted of Agassiz himself, Count de Pourtales, Dr. Franz Steindachner, and Mr. Blake, a young student from the Museum, who accompanied Agassiz as assistant and draughtsman. Dr. Thomas Hill, ex-president of Harvard University, was also on the expedition, and though engaged in special investigations of his own, he joined in all the work with genial interest. [692] The vessel was commanded by Captain (now Commodore) Philip C. Johnson, whose courtesy and kindness made the Hassler a floating home to the guests on board. So earnest and active was the sympathy felt by him and his officers in the scientific interests of the expedition, that they might be counted as a valuable additional volunteer corps. Among them should be counted Dr. William White, of Philadelphia, who accompanied the expedition in a partly professional, partly scientific capacity. The hopes Agassiz had formed of this expedition, as high as those of any young explorer, were only partially fulfilled. His enthusiasm, though it had the ardor of youth, had none of its vagueness. In a letter to Mr. Peirce, published in the Museum Bulletin at this time, there is this passage: ‘If this world of ours is the work of intelligence and not merely the product of force and matter, the human mind, as a part of the whole, should so chime with it, that from what is known it may reach the unknown. If this be so, the knowledge gathered should, within the limits of error which its imperfection renders unavoidable, enable us to foretell what we are likely to find in the deepest abysses of the sea.’ He looked, in short, for the solution of special [693] problems directly connected with all his previous work. He believed the deeper sea would show forms of life akin to animals of earlier geological times, throwing new light on the relation between the fossil and the living world. In the letter above quoted, he even named the species he expected to find most prevalent in those greater depths: as, for instance, representatives of the older forms of Ganoids and Selachians; Cephalopods, resembling the more ancient chambered shells; Gasteropods, recalling the tertiary and cretaceous types; and Acephala, resembling those of the jurassic and cretaceous formations. He expected to find Crustaceans also, more nearly approaching the ancient Trilobites than those now living on the surface of the globe; and among Radiates he looked for the older forms of sea-urchins, star-fishes, and corals. Although the collections brought together on this cruise were rich and interesting, they gave but imperfect answers to these comprehensive questions. Owing to defects in the dredging apparatus, the hauls from the greatest depths were lost. With reference to the glacial period he anticipated still more positive results. In the same letter the following passage occurs: [694]
There is, however, still one kind of evidence wanting, to remove all doubt that the greater extension of glaciers in former ages was connected with cosmic changes in the physical condition of our globe. Namely, all the phenomena relating to the glacial period must be found in the southern hemisphere, accompanied by the same characteristic features as in the north, but with this essential difference,— that everything must be reversed. The trend of the glacial abrasions must be from the south northward, the lee-side of abraded rocks must be on the north side of the hills and mountain ranges, and the boulders must have traveled from the south to their present position. Whether this be so or not, has not yet been ascertained by direct observation. I expect to find it so throughout the temperate and cold zones of the southern hemisphere, with the exception of the present glaciers of Terra del Fuego and Patagonia, which may have transported boulders in every direction. Even in Europe, geologists have not yet sufficiently discriminated between local glaciers and the phenomena connected with their different degrees of successive retreat on the one hand; and, on the other, the facts indicating the action of an extensive sheet of ice moving [695] over the whole continent from north to south. Among the facts already known from the southern hemisphere are the so-called rivers of stone in the Falkland Islands, which attracted the attention of Darwin during his cruise with Captain Fitzroy, and which have remained an enigma to this day. I believe it will not be difficult to explain their origin in the light of the glacial theory, and I fancy they may turn out to be ground moraines similar to the ‘horsebacks’ in Maine. You may ask what this question of drift has to do with deep-sea dredging? The connection is closer than may at first appear. If drift is not of glacial origin, but is the product of marine currents, its formation at once becomes a matter for the Coast Survey to investigate. But I believe it will be found in the end, that so far from being accumulated by the sea, the drift of the Patagonian lowlands has been worn away by the sea to its present outline, like the northern shores of South America and Brazil. ...This is not the place for a detailed account of the voyage of the Hassler, but enough may be told to show something of Agassiz's own share in it. A journal of scientific and personal experience, kept by Mrs. Agassiz under [696] his direction, was nearly ready for publication at the time of his death. The two next chapters, devoted to the cruise of the Hassler, are taken from that manuscript. A portion of it appeared many years ago in the pages of the ‘Atlantic Monthly.’
