Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Every night she anchored in the sheltered harbors formed by the inlets and fords which break the base of the rocky walls, and often lead into narrower ocean defiles penetrating, one knows not whither, into the deeper heart of these great mountain masses. These were weeks of exquisite delight to Agassiz. The vessel often skirted the shore so closely that its geology could be studied from the deck.
For Professor Agassiz he formed a warm friendship; and their discussions regarding geological questions were very interesting, eliciting from Agassiz a striking tribute to Mr. Cornell's closeness of observation and sagacity in reasoning. The lectures on history by Goldwin Smith, and on literature by James Russell Lowell, George William Curtis, and Bayard Taylor, he also enjoyed greatly.
On Lake Agassiz, in the N.Y. Zoological Park, within 500 feet of my office in the Administration Building, a pair of wild wood-ducks made their nest last spring, and have just finished rearing nine fine, healthy young birds. Whenever you see a wood-duck rise and fly in our Park, you may know that it is a wild bird.
Although, as I recall upon several occasions, Agassiz could express his views delightfully and impressively to a single auditor, his eminently social nature and his lifelong habit rendered it easier for him to address a group of interested listeners. The following incident does not seem to have been recorded in my diary, but it is distinctly remembered.
Those whose privilege it was to know both father and son will be slow to admit that the elder Agassiz was the greater man. His attainments, however, were probably not less great, and it remains to be seen whether his discoveries were not as epoch-making.
The effectiveness of The "Present Crisis" and "Sir Launfal," and of the "Memorial Odes," particularly the "Ode to Agassiz," is likewise due to the passion, sweetness, and splendor of certain strophes, rather than to the perfection of these poems as artistic wholes. Lowell's personal lyrics of sorrow, such as "The Changeling," "The First SnowFall," "After the Burial," have touched many hearts.
This audience, composed of strongly contrasted elements and based upon purely democratic principles, had, from the first, a marked attraction for Agassiz. A teacher in the widest sense, he sought and found his pupils in every class.
Some geologists appear much inclined to think that there was at this time a new development of terrestrial animal life upon the globe, and M. Agassiz, whose opinion on such a subject must always be worthy of attention, speaks all but decidedly for such a conclusion.
We will now turn for a short space to the lower divisions of the animal kingdom. These forceps can seize firmly hold of any object; and Alexander Agassiz has seen an Echinus or sea-urchin rapidly passing particles of excrement from forceps to forceps down certain lines of its body, in order that its shell should not be fouled.
He loved human nature as Cuvier and Agassiz loved animal nature; in his view, as in their view, the subject formed a vast living picture.
Word Of The Day