United States with his father in 1846; graduated at Harvard in 1855, subsequently studying engineering and chemistry, and taking the degree of bachelor of science at the Lawrence scientific school of the same institution in 1857; and in 1859 became an assistant in the United States Coast Survey. Thenceforward he became a specialist in marine ichthyology, but devoted much time to the investigation, superintendence and exploitation of mines, being superintendent of the Calumet and Hecla copper mines, Lake Superior, from 1866 to 1869, and afterwards, as a stockholder, acquiring a fortune, out of which he gave to Harvard, for the museum of comparative zoology and other purposes, some $500,000. In 1875 he surveyed Lake Titicaca, Peru, examined the copper mines of Peru and Chile, and made a collection of Peruvian antiquities for that museum, of which he was curator from 1874 to 1885. He assisted Sir Wyville Thomson in the examination and classification of the collections of the “Challenger” exploring expedition, and wrote the Review of the Echini (2 vols., 1872–1874) in the reports. Between 1877 and 1880 he took part in the three dredging expeditions of the steamer “Blake,” of the United States Coast Survey, and presented a full account of them in two volumes (1888). Of his other writings on marine zoology, most are contained in the bulletins and memoirs of the museum of comparative zoology; but he published in 1865 (with Elizabeth Cary Agassiz, his stepmother) Seaside Studies in Natural History, a work at once exact and stimulating, and in 1871 Marine Animals of Massachusetts Bay.
AGASSIZ, JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE (1807–1873), Swiss naturalist and geologist, was the son of the Protestant pastor of the parish of Motier, on the north-eastern shore of the Lake of Morat (Murten See), and not far from the eastern extremity of the Lake of Neuchâtel. Agassiz was born at this retired place on the 28th of May 1807. Educated first at home, then spending four years at the gymnasium of Bienne, he completed his elementary studies at the academy of Lausanne. Having adopted medicine as his profession, he studied successively at the universities of Zurich, Heidelberg and Munich; and he availed himself of the advantages afforded by these universities for extending his knowledge of natural history, especially of botany. After completing his academical course, he took in 1829 his degree of doctor of philosophy at Erlangen, and in 1830 that of doctor of medicine at Munich.
Up to this time he had paid no special attention to the study of ichthyology, which soon afterwards became the great occupation of his life. Agassiz always declared that he was led into ichthyological pursuits through the following circumstances:—In 1819–1820, J. B. Spix and C. F. P. von Martius were engaged in their celebrated Brazilian tour, and on their return to Europe, amongst other collections of natural objects they brought home an important set of the freshwater fishes of Brazil, and especially of the Amazon river. Spix, who died in 1826, did not live long enough to work out the history of these fishes; and Agassiz, though little more than a youth just liberated from his academic studies, was selected by Prof. Martius for this purpose. He at once threw himself into the work with that earnestness of spirit which characterized him to the end of his busy life, and the task of describing and figuring the Brazilian fishes was completed and published in 1829. This was followed by an elaborate research into the history of the fishes found in the Lake of Neuchâtel. Enlarging his plans, he issued in 1830 a prospectus of a History of the Freshwater Fishes of Central Europe. It was only in 1839, however, that the first part of this publication appeared, and it was completed in 1842. In 1832 he was appointed professor of natural history in the university of Neuchâtel. Having become a professed ichthyologist, it was impossible that the fossil fishes should fail to attract his attention. The rich stores furnished by the slates of Glarus and the limestones of Monte Bolca were already well known; but very little had been accomplished in the way of scientific study of them. Agassiz, as early as 1829, with his wonted enthusiasm, planned the publication of the work which, more than any other, laid the foundation of his world-wide fame. Five volumes of his Recherches sur les poissons fossiles appeared at intervals from 1833 to 1843 [1844]. They were magnificently illustrated, chiefly through the labours of Joseph Dinkel, an artist of remarkable power in delineating natural objects. In gathering materials for this great work Agassiz visited the principal museums in Europe, and meeting Cuvier in Paris, he received much encouragement and assistance from him.
Agassiz found that his palaeontological labours rendered necessary a new basis of ichthyological classification. The fossils rarely exhibited any traces of the soft tissues of fishes. They consisted chiefly of the teeth, scales and fins, even the bones being perfectly preserved in comparatively few instances. He therefore adopted his well-known classification, which divided fishes into four groups—viz. Ganoids, Placoids, Cycloids and Ctenoids, based on the nature of the scales and other dermal appendages. While Agassiz did much to place the subject on a scientific basis, his classification has not been found to meet the requirements of modern research As remarked by Dr A. Smith-Woodward, he sought to interpret the past structures by too rigorous a comparison with those of living forms. (See Catalogue of Fossil Fishes in the British Natural History Museum.)
As the important descriptive work of Agassiz proceeded, it became obvious that it would over-tax his resources, unless assistance could be afforded. The British Association came to his aid, and the earl of Ellesmere—then Lord Francis Egerton—gave him yet more efficient help. The original drawings made for the work, chiefly by Dinkel, amounted to 1290 in number. These were purchased by the Earl, and presented by him to the Geological Society of London. In 1836 the Wollaston medal was awarded by the council of that society to Agassiz for his work on fossil ichthyology; and in 1838 he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Society. Meanwhile the invertebrate animals engaged his attention. In 1837 he issued the “Prodrome” of a monograph on the recent and fossil Echinodermata, the first part of which appeared in 1838; in 1839–1840 he published two quarto volumes on the fossil Echinoderms of Switzerland; and in 1840–1845 he issued his Études critiques sur les mollusques fossiles.
Subsequently to his first visit to England in 1834, the labours of Hugh Miller and other geologists brought to light the remarkable fishes of the Old Red Sandstone of the north-east of Scotland. The strange forms of the Pterichthys, the Coccosteus and other genera were then made known to geologists for the first time. They naturally were of intense interest to Agassiz, and formed the subject of a special monograph by him published in 1844–1845: Monographie des poissons fossiles du Vieux Grès Rouge, ou Système Dévonien (Old Red Sandstone) des Iles Britanniques et de Russie.
The year 1836 witnessed the inauguration of a new investigation, which proved to be of the utmost importance to geological science. Previously to this date de Saussure, Venetz, Charpentier and others had made the glaciers of the Alps the subjects of special study, and Charpentier had even arrived at the conclusion that the erratic blocks of alpine rocks scattered over the slopes and summits of the Jura mountains had been conveyed thither by glaciers. The question having attracted the attention of Agassiz, he not only made successive journeys to the alpine regions in company with Charpentier, but he had a hut constructed upon one of the Aar glaciers, which for a time he made his home, in order to investigate thoroughly the structure and movements of the ice. These labours resulted in the publication of his grand work in two volumes entitled Études sur les glaciers, 1840. Therein he discussed the movements of the glaciers, their moraines, their influence in grooving and rounding the rocks over which they travelled, and in producing the striations and roches moutonnées with which we are now so familiar. He not only accepted Charpentier’s idea that some of the alpine glaciers had extended across the wide plains and valleys drained by the Aar and the Rhone, and thus landed parts of their remains upon the uplands of the Jura, but he went still farther. He concluded that, at a period geologically recent, Switzerland had been another Greenland; that instead of a few glaciers stretching across the
