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 gratitude.

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 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.

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 Association 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 God'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 God's creatures. I send you an old man's blessing, and remain,

Your affectionate friend,

ADAM SEDGWICK.

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.

FROM PROFESSOR PEIRCE.

COAST SURVEY OFFICE, WASHINGTON, 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?. . .

FROM AGASSIZ TO PROFESSOR PEIRCE.

CAMBRIDGE, February 20, 1871.

. . .I am overjoyed at the prospect your letter opens before me. Of course I will go, unless Brown-Sequard orders me positively to stay on terra firma. But even then, I should like to have a hand in arranging the party, as I feel there never was, and is not likely soon again to be, such an opportunity for promoting the cause of science generally, and that of natural history in particular. I would like Pourtales and Alex to be of the party, and both would gladly join if they can. Both are as much interested about it as I am, and I have no doubt between us we may organize a working team, strong enough to do something creditable. It seems to me that the best plan to pursue in the survey would be to select carefully a few points (as many as time would allow) on shore, from which to work at right angles with the coast, to as great a distance as the results would justify, and then move on to some other head-land. If this plan be adopted, it would be desirable to have one additional observer to make collections on shore, to connect with the result of the dredgings. This would be the more important as, with the exception of Brazil, hardly anything is known of the shore faunae upon the greater part of the South American coast. For shore observations I should like a man of the calibre of Dr. Steindachner, who has spent a year on the coast of Senegal, and would thus bring a knowledge of the opposite side of the Atlantic as a starting basis of comparison. . .

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. 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 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: "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 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 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."

CHAPTER 23.

1871-1872: AGE 64-65.

Sailing of the Hassler. Sargassum Fields. Dredging at Barbados. From the West Indies to Rio de Janeiro. Monte Video. Quarantine. Glacial Traces in the Bay of Monte Video. The Gulf of Mathias. Dredging off Gulf of St. George. Dredging off Cape Virgens. Possession Bay. Salt Pool. Moraine. Sandy Point. Cruise through the Straits. Scenery. Wind Storm. Borja Bay. Glacier Bay. Visit to the Glacier. Chorocua Bay.

The vessel was to have started in August, but, owing to various delays in her completion, she was not ready for sea until the late autumn. She finally sailed on December 4, 1871, on a gray afternoon, which ushered in the first snow-storm of the New England winter. Bound for warmer skies, she was, however, soon in the waters of the Gulf Stream, where the work of collecting began in the fields of Sargassum, those drifting, wide-spread expanses of loose sea-weed carrying a countless population, lilliputian in size, to be sure, but very various in character. Agassiz was no less interested than other naturalists have been in the old question so long asked and still unanswered, about the Sargassum. "Where is its home, and what its origin? Does it float, a rootless wanderer on the deep, or has it broken away from some submarine attachment?" He had passed through the same region before, in going to Brazil, but then he was on a large ocean steamer, while from the little Hassler, of 360 tons, one could almost fish by hand from the Sargassum fields. Some of the chief results are given in the following letter.

TO PROFESSOR PEIRCE.

ST. THOMAS, December 15, 1871.

. . .As soon as we reached the Gulf Stream we began work. Indeed, Pourtales had organized a party to study the temperatures as soon as we passed Gay Head, and will himself report to you his results. My own attention was entirely turned to the Gulf weed and its inhabitants, of which we made extensive collections. Our observations on the floating weed itself favor the view of those who believe it to be torn from rocks, on which Sargassum naturally grows. I made a simple experiment which seems to me conclusive. Any branch of the sea-weed which is deprived of its FLOATS sinks at once to the bottom of the water, and these floats are not likely to be the first parts developed from the spores. Moreover, after examining large quantities of the weed, I have not seen a single branch, however small, which did not show marks of having been torn from a solid attachment.

You may hardly feel an interest in my zoological observations, but I am sure you will be glad to learn that we had the best opportunity of carefully examining most of the animals known to inhabit the Gulf weed, and some also which I did not know to occur among them. The most interesting discovery of our voyage thus far, however, is that of a nest built by a fish, and floating on the broad ocean with its living freight. On the 13th, Mr. Mansfield, one of our officers, brought me a ball of Gulf weed which he had just picked up, and which excited my curiosity to the utmost. It was a round mass of Sargassum about the size of two fists. The bulk of the ball was made up of closely packed branches and leaves, held together by fine threads, running through them in every direction, while other branches hung more loosely from the margin. Placed in a large bowl of water it became apparent that the loose branches served to keep the central mass floating, cradle-like, between them. The elastic threads, which held the ball of Gulf weed together, were beaded at intervals, sometimes two or three beads close together, or a bunch of them hanging from the same cluster of threads, or occasionally scattered at a greater distance from each other. Nowhere was there much regularity in the distribution of the beads. They were scattered pretty uniformly throughout the whole ball of seaweed, and were themselves about the size of an ordinary pin's head. Evidently we had before us a nest of the most curious kind, full of eggs. What animal could have built this singular nest? It did not take long to ascertain the class to which it belonged. A common pocket lens revealed at once two large eyes on the side of the head, and a tail bent over the back of the body, as in the embryo of ordinary fishes shortly before the period of hatching. The many empty egg cases in the nest gave promise of an early opportunity of seeing some embryos, freeing themselves from their envelope. Meanwhile a number of these eggs containing live embryos were cut out of the nest and placed in separate glass jars, in order to multiply the chances of preserving them; while the nest as a whole was secured in alcohol, as a memorial of our discovery.

The next day I found two embryos in my glass jars; they moved occasionally in jerks, and then rested a long time motionless on the bottom of the jar. On the third day I had over a dozen of these young fishes, the oldest beginning to be more active. I need not relate in detail the evidence I soon obtained that these embryos were actually fishes. . .But what kind of fish was it? At about the time of hatching, the fins differ too much from those of the adult, and the general form has too few peculiarities, to give any clew to this problem. I could only suppose it would prove to be one of the pelagic species of the Atlantic. In former years I had made a careful study of the pigment cells of the skin in a variety of young fishes, and I now resorted to this method to identify my embryos. Happily we had on board several pelagic fishes alive. The very first comparison I made gave the desired result. The pigment cell of a young Chironectes pictus proved identical with those of our little embryos. It thus stands, as a well authenticated fact, that the common pelagic Chironectes of the Atlantic, named Ch. pictus by Cuvier, builds a nest for its eggs in which the progeny is wrapped up with the materials of which the nest itself is composed; and as these materials consist of the living Gulf weed, the fish cradle, rocking upon the deep ocean, is carried along as in an arbor, which affords protection and afterwards food also, to its living freight. This marvelous story acquires additional interest, when we consider the characteristic peculiarities of the genus Chironectes. As its name indicates, it has fin-like hands; that is to say, the pectoral fins are supported by a kind of long wrist-like appendage, and the rays of the ventrals are not unlike rude fingers. With these limbs these fishes have long been known to attach themselves to sea-weeds, and rather to walk than to swim in their natural element. But now that we know their mode of reproduction, it may fairly be asked if the most important use of their peculiarly constructed fins is not the building of their nest?. . .There thus remains one closing chapter to the story. May some naturalist, becalmed among the Gulf weed, have the good fortune to witness the process by which the nest is built. . .

This whole investigation was of the greatest interest to Agassiz, and, coming so early in the voyage, seemed a pleasant promise of its farther opportunities. The whole ship's company soon shared his enthusiasm, and the very sailors gathered about him in the intervals of their work, or hung on the outskirts of the scientific circle. A pause of a few days was made at one or two of the West Indian islands, at St. Thomas and Barbados. At the latter, the first cast of the large dredge was made on a ledge of shoals in a depth of eighty fathoms, and, among countless other things, a number of stemmed crinoids and comatulae were brought up. An ardent student of the early fossil echinoderms, it was a great pleasure to Agassiz to gather their fresh and living representatives. It was like turning a leaf of the past and finding the subtle thread which connects it with the present.

TO PROFESSOR PEIRCE.

PERNAMBUCO, January 16, 1872.

MY DEAR PEIRCE,

I should have written to you from Barbados, but the day before we left the island was favorable for dredging, and our success in that line was so unexpectedly great, that I could not get away from the specimens, and made the most of them for study while I had the chance. We made only four hauls, in between seventy-five and one hundred and twenty fathoms. But what hauls! Enough to occupy half a dozen competent zoologists for a whole year, if the specimens could be kept fresh for that length of time. The first haul brought up a Chemidium-like sponge; the next gave us a crinoid, very much like the Rhizocrinus lofotensis, but probably different; the third, a living Pleurotomaria; the fourth, a new genus of Spatangoids, etc., etc., not to speak of the small fry. We had the crinoid alive for ten or twelve hours. When contracted, the pinnules are pressed against the arms, and the arms themselves shut against one another, so that the whole looks like a swash made up of a few long, coarse twines. When the animal opens, the arms at first separate without bending outside, so that the whole looks like an inverted pentapod; but gradually the tips of the arms bend outward as the arms diverge more and more, and when fully expanded the crown has the appearance of a lily of the L. martagon type, in which each petal is curved upon itself, the pinnules of the arms spreading laterally more and more, as the crown is more fully open. I have not been able to detect any motion in the stem traceable to contraction, though there is no stiffness in its bearing. When disturbed, the pinnules of the arms first contract, the arms straighten themselves out, and the whole gradually and slowly closes up. It was a very impressive sight for me to watch the movements of the creature, for it not only told of its own ways, but at the same time afforded a glimpse into the countless ages of the past, when these crinoids, so rare and so rarely seen nowadays, formed a prominent feature of the animal kingdom. I could see, without great effort of the imagination, the shoal of Lockport teeming with the many genera of crinoids which the geologists of New York have rescued from that prolific Silurian deposit, or recall the formations of my native country, in the hill-sides of which also, among fossils indicating shoal water deposits, other crinoids abound, resembling still more closely those we find in these waters. The close affinities of Rhizocrinus with Apiocrinoids are further exemplified by the fact that when the animal dies, it casts off its arms, like Apiocrinus, the head of which is generally found without arms. And now the question may be asked, what is the meaning of the occurrence of these animals in deep waters at the present day, when, in former ages, similar types inhabited shallow seas? Of the fact there can be no doubt, for it is not difficult to adduce satisfactory evidence of the shoal-like character of the Silurian deposits of the State of New York; their horizontal position, combined with the gradual recession of the higher beds in a southerly direction, leaves no doubt upon this point; and in the case of the jurassic formation alluded to above, the combination of the crinoids with fossils common upon coral reefs, and their presence in atolls of that period, are satisfactory proofs of my assertion. What does it mean, then, when we find the Pentacrinus and Rhizocrinus of the West Indies in deep water only? It seems to me that there is but one explanation of the fact, namely, that in the progress of the earth's growth, we must look for such a displacement of the conditions favorable to the maintenance of certain lower types, as may recall most fully the adaptations of former ages. It was in this sense I alluded, in my first letter to you, to the probability of our finding in deeper water representatives of earlier geological types; and if my explanation is correct, my anticipation is also fully sustained. But do the deeper waters of the present constitution of our globe really approximate the conditions for the development of animal life, which existed in the shallower seas of past geological ages? I think they do, or at least I believe they approach it as nearly as anything can in the present order of things upon earth; for the depths of the ocean alone can place animals under a pressure corresponding to that caused by the heavy atmosphere of earlier periods. But, of course, such high pressure as animals meet in great depths cannot be a favorable condition for the development of life; hence the predominance of lower forms in the deep sea. The rapid diminution of light with the increasing depth, and the small amount of free oxygen in these waters under greater and greater pressure, not to speak of other limitations arising from the greater uniformity of the conditions of existence, the reduced amount and less variety of nutritive substances, etc., etc., are so many causes acting in the same direction and with similar results. For all these reasons, I have always expected to find that the animals living in great depths would prove to be of a standing, in the scale of structural complications, inferior to those found in shoal waters or near shore; and the correlation elsewhere pointed out between the standing of animals and their order of succession in geological times (see "Essay on Classification ") justifies another form of expression of these facts, namely, that in deeper waters we should expect to find representatives of earlier geological periods. There is in all this nothing which warrants the conclusion that any of the animals now living are lineal descendants of those of earlier ages; nor does their similarity to those of earlier periods justify the statement that the cretaceous formation is still extant. It would be just as true to nature to say that the tertiaries are continued in the tropics, on account of the similarity of the miocene mammalia to those of the torrid zone.

We have another case in the Pleurotomaria. It is not long since it has been made known that the genus Pleurotomaria is not altogether extinct, a single specimen having been discovered about ten years ago in the West Indies. Even Pictet, in the second edition of his Paleontology, still considers Pleurotomaria as extinct, and as belonging to the fossiliferous formations which extend from the Silurian period to the Tertiary. Of the living species found at Marie Galante, nothing is known except the specific characteristics of the shell. We dredged it in one hundred and twenty fathoms, on the west side of Barbados, alive, and kept it alive for twenty-four hours, during which time the animal expanded and showed its remarkable peculiarities. It is unquestionably the type of a distinct family, entirely different from the other Mollusks with which it has been hitherto associated. Mr. Blake has made fine colored drawings of it, which may be published at some future time. . .The family of the Pleurotomariae numbers between four and five hundred fossil species, beginning in the Silurian deposits, but especially numerous in the carboniferous and jurassic formations.

The sponges afford another interesting case. When the first number of the great work of Goldfuss, on the fossils of Germany, made its appearance, about half a century ago, the most novel types it made known were several genera of sponges from the jurassic and cretaceous beds, described under the names of Siphonia, Chemidium, and Scyphia. Nothing of the kind has been known among the living to this day; and yet, the first haul of the dredge near Barbados gave us a Chemidium, or, at least, a sponge so much like the fossil Chemidium, that it must remain for future comparisons to determine whether there are any generic differences between our living sponge and the fossil. The next day brought us a genuine Siphonia, another genus thus far only known from the jurassic beds; and it is worth recording, that I noticed in the collection of Governor Rawson another sponge,—brought to him by a fisherman who had caught it on his line, on the coast of Barbados,—which belongs to the genus Scyphia. Thus the three characteristic genera of sponges from the secondary formation, till now supposed to be extinct, are all three represented in the deep waters of the West Indies. . .

Another family of organized beings offers a similar testimony to that already alluded to. If there is a type of Echinoderms characteristic of a geological period, it is the genus Micraster of the cretaceous formation, in its original circumscription. No species of this genus is known to have existed during the Tertiary era, and no living species has as yet been made known. You may therefore imagine my surprise when the dredge first yielded three specimens of a small species of that particular group of the genus, which is most extensively represented in the upper cretaceous beds.

Other examples of less importance might be enumerated; suffice it now to add that my expectation of finding in deep waters animals already known, but thus far exceedingly rare in museums, is already in a measure realised. . .

Little can be said of the voyage from the West Indies to Rio de Janeiro. It had the usual vicissitudes of weather, with here and there a flight (so it might justly be called) of flying-fish, a school of porpoises or dog-fish, or a sail in the distance, to break the monotony. At Rio de Janeiro it became evident that the plan of the voyage must be somewhat curtailed. This was made necessary partly by the delays in starting,—in consequence of which the season would be less favorable than had been anticipated along certain portions of the proposed route,—and partly by the defective machinery, which had already given some trouble to the Captain. The Falkland Islands, the Rio Negro, and the Santa Cruz rivers were therefore renounced; with what regret will be understood by those who know how hard it is to be forced to break up a scheme of work, which was originally connected in all its parts. The next pause was at Monte Video; but as there was a strict quarantine, Agassiz was only allowed to land at the Mount, a hill on the western side of the bay, the geology of which he was anxious to examine. He found true erratics—loose pebbles, granite, gneiss, and granitic sandstone, having no resemblance to any native rock in the vicinity—scattered over the whole surface of the hill to its very summit. The hill itself had also the character of the "roches moutonnees" modeled by ice in the northern hemisphere. As these were the most northern erratics and glaciated surfaces reported in the southern hemisphere, the facts there were very interesting to him.

With dredgings off the Rio de la Plata, and along the coast between that and the Rio Negro, the vessel held on her way to the Gulf of Mathias, a deep, broad bay running some hundred miles inland, and situated a little south of the Rio Negro. Here some necessary repairs enforced a pause, of which Agassiz took advantage for dredging and for studying the geology of the cliffs along the north side of the bay. As seen from the vessel, they seemed to be stratified with extraordinary evenness and regularity to within a few feet of the top, the summit being crowned with loose sand. Farther on, they sank to sand dunes piled into rounded banks and softly moulded ledges, like snow-drifts. Landing the next day at a bold bluff marked Cliff End on the charts, he found the lower stratum to consist of a solid mass of tertiary fossils, chiefly immense oysters, mingled, however, with sea-urchins. Superb specimens were secured,—large boulders crowded with colossal shells and perfectly preserved echini. From the top of the cliff, looking inland, only a level plain was seen, stretching as far as the eye could reach, broken by no undulations, and covered with low, scrubby growth. The seine was drawn on the beach, and yielded a good harvest for the fish collection. At evening the vessel anchored at the head of the bay, off the Port of San Antonio. The name would seem to imply some settlement; but a more lonely spot cannot be imagined. More than thirty years ago, Fitzroy had sailed up this bay, partially surveyed it, and marked this harbor on his chart. If any vessel has broken the loneliness of its waters since, no record of any such event has been kept. Of the presence of man, there was no sign. Yet the few days passed there were among the pleasantest of the voyage to Agassiz. The work of the dredge and seine was extremely successful, and the rambles inland were geological excursions of great interest. Here he had the first sight of the guanaco of the Patagonian plains. The weather was fine, and at night-fall, to the golden light of sunset succeeded the fitful glow, over land and water, of the bonfires built by the sailors on the beach. Returning to the ship after dark, the various parties assembled in the wardroom, to talk over the events of the day and lay out plans for the morrow. These are the brightest hours in such a voyage, when the novelty of the locality gives a zest to every walk or row, and all are full of interest in a new and exciting life. One is more tolerant even of monotonous natural features in a country so isolated, so withdrawn from human life and occupation. The very barrenness seems in harmony with the intense solitude.

The Hassler left her anchorage on this desolate shore on an evening of singular beauty. It was difficult to tell when she was on her way, so quietly did she move through the glassy waters, over which the sun went down in burnished gold, leaving the sky without a cloud. The light of the beach fires followed her till they too faded, and only the phosphorescence of the sea attended her into the night. Rough and stormy weather followed this fair start, and only two more dredgings were possible before reaching the Strait of Magellan. One was off the Gulf of St. George, where gigantic star-fishes seemed to have their home. One of them, a superb basket-fish, was not less than a foot and a half in diameter; and another, like a huge sunflower of reddish purple tint, with straight arms, thirty-seven in number, radiating from the disk, was of about the same size. Many beautiful little sea-urchins came up in the same dredging. About fifty miles north of Cape Virgens, in tolerably calm weather, another haul was tried, and this time the dredge returned literally solid with Ophiurans.

On Wednesday, March 13th, on a beautifully clear morning, like the best October weather in New England, the Hassler rounded Cape Virgens and entered the Strait of Magellan. The tide was just on the flood, and all the conditions favorable for her run to her first anchorage in the Strait at Possession Bay. Here the working force divided, to form two shore parties, one of which, under Agassiz's direction, the reader may follow. The land above the first shore bluff at Possession Bay rises to a height of some four hundred feet above the sea-level, in a succession of regular horizontal terraces, of which Agassiz counted eight. On these terraces, all of which are built, like the shore-bluffs, of tertiary deposits, were two curious remnants of a past state of things. The first was a salt-pool lying in a depression on the second terrace, some one hundred and fifty feet above the sea. This pool contained living marine shells, identical with those now found along the shore. Among them were Fusus, Mytilus, Buccinum, Fissurella, Patella, and Voluta, all found in the same numeric relations as those in which they now exist upon the beach below. This pool is altogether too high to be reached by any tidal influence, and undoubtedly indicates an old sea-level, and a comparatively recent upheaval of the shore. The second was a genuine moraine, corresponding in every respect to those which occur all over the northern hemisphere. Agassiz came upon it in ascending to the third terrace above the salt-pool and a little farther inland. It had all the character of a terminal moraine in contact with an actual glacier. It was composed of heterogeneous materials,—large and small pebbles and boulders impacted together in a paste of clayey gravel and sand. The ice had evidently advanced from the south, for the mass had been pushed steeply up on the southern side, and retained so sharp an inclination on that face that but little vegetation had accumulated upon it. The northern side, on the contrary, was covered with soil and overgrown; it sloped gently off,—pebbles and larger stones being scattered beyond it. The pebbles and boulders of this moraine were polished, scratched, and grooved, and bore, in short, all the usual marks of glacial action. Agassiz was naturally delighted with this discovery. It was a new link in the chain of evidence, showing that the drift phenomena are connected at the south as well as at the north with the action of ice, and that the frozen Arctic and Antarctic fields are but remnants of a sheet of ice, which has retreated from the temperate zones of both hemispheres to the polar regions. The party pushed on beyond the moraine to a hill of considerable height, which gave a fine view of the country toward Mount Aymon and the so-called Asses' Ears. They brought back a variety of game, but their most interesting scientific acquisitions were boulders from the moraine scored with glacial characters, and shells from the salt pool.

Still accompanied by beautiful weather, the Hassler anchored at the Elizabeth Islands and at San Magdalena. Here Agassiz had an opportunity of examining the haunts and rookeries of the penguins and cormorants, and obtaining fine specimens of both. As the breeding places and the modes of life of these animals have been described by other travelers, there is nothing new to add from his impressions, until the vessel anchored, on the 16th March, before Sandy Point, the only permanent settlement in the Strait.

Here there was a pause of several days, which gave Agassiz an opportunity to draw the seine with large results for his marine collections. By the courtesy of the Governor, he had also an opportunity of making an excursion along the road leading to the coal-mines. The wooded cliffs, as one ascends the hills toward the mines, are often bold and picturesque, and Agassiz found that portions of them were completely built of fossil shells. There is an oyster-bank, some one hundred feet high, overhanging the road in massive ledges that consist wholly of oyster-valves, with only earth enough to bind them together. He was inclined, from the character of the shells, to believe that the coal must be cretaceous rather than tertiary.

On Tuesday, the 19th March, the Hassler left Sandy Point. The weather was beautiful,—a mellow autumn day with a reminiscence of summer in its genial warmth. The cleft summit of Sarmiento was clear against the sky, and the snow-fields, swept over by alternate light and shadow, seemed full of soft undulations. The evening anchorage was in the Bay of Port Famine, a name which marks the site of Sarmiento's ill-fated colony, and recalls the story of the men who watched and waited there for the help that never came. The stay here was short, and Agassiz spent the time almost wholly in studying the singularly regular, but completely upturned strata which line the beach, with edges so worn down as to be almost completely even with each other.

For many days after this, the Hassler pursued her course, past a seemingly endless panorama of mountains and forests rising into the pale regions of snow and ice, where lay glaciers in which every rift and crevasse, as well as the many cascades flowing down to join the waters beneath, could be counted as she steamed by them. 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. The rounded shoulders of the mountains, in marked contrast to their peaked and jagged crests, the general character of the snow-fields and glaciers, not crowded into narrow valleys as in Switzerland, but spread out on the open slopes of the loftier ranges, or, dome like, capping their summits,—all this afforded data for comparison with his past experience, and with the knowledge he had accumulated upon like phenomena in other regions. Here, as in the Alps, the abrupt line, where the rounded and worn surfaces of the mountains (moutonnees, as the Swiss say) yield to their sharply cut, jagged crests, showed him the ancient and highest line reached by the glacial action. The long, serrated edge of Mount Tarn, for instance, is like a gigantic saw, while the lower shoulders of the mass are hummocked into a succession of rounded hills. In like manner the two beautiful valleys, separated by a bold bluff called Bachelor's Peak, are symmetrically rounded on their slopes, while their summits are jagged and rough.

On one occasion the Hassler encountered one of those sudden and startling flaws of wind common to the Strait. The breeze, which had been strong all day, increased with sudden fury just as the vessel was passing through a rather narrow channel, which gave the wind the additional force of compression. In an inconceivably short time, the channel was lashed into a white foam; the roar of wind and water was so great you could not hear yourself speak, though the hoarse shout of command and the answering cry of the sailors rose above the storm. To add to the confusion, a loose sail slatted as if it would tear itself in pieces, with that sharp, angry, rending sound which only a broad spread of loose canvas can make. It became impossible to hold the vessel against the amazing power of the blast, and the Captain turned her round with the intention of putting her into Borja Bay, not far from which, by good fortune, she chanced to be. As she came broadside to the wind in turning, it seemed as if she must be blown over, so violently did she careen. Once safely round, she flew before the wind, which now became her ally instead of her enemy, and by its aid she was soon abreast of Borja Bay. Never was there a more sudden transition from chaos to peace than that which ensued as she turned in from the tumult in the main channel to the quiet waters of the bay. The Hassler almost filled the tiny harbor shut in between mountains. She lay there safe and sheltered in breathless calm, while the storm raged and howled outside. These frequent, almost land-locked coves, are the safety of navigators in these straits; but after this day's experience, it was easy to understand how sailing vessels may be kept waiting for months between two such harbors, struggling vainly to make a few miles and constantly driven back by sudden squalls.

In this exquisite mountain-locked harbor, the vessel was weather-bound for a couple of days. Count Pourtales availed himself of this opportunity to ascend one of the summits. Up to a height of fifteen hundred feet, the rock was characterized by the smoothed, rounded surfaces which Agassiz had observed along his whole route in the Strait. Above that height all was broken and rugged, the line of separation being as defined as on any valley wall in Switzerland. It was again impossible to decide, on such short observation, whether these effects were due to local glacial action, or whether they belonged to an earlier general ice-period. But Agassiz became satisfied, as he advanced, that the two sets of phenomena existed together, as in the northern hemisphere. The general aspect of the opposite walls of the Strait confirmed him in the idea that the sheet of ice in its former extension had advanced from south to north, grinding its way against and over the southern wall to the plains beyond. In short, he was convinced that, as a sheet of ice has covered the northern portion of the globe, so a sheet of ice has covered also the southern portion, advancing, in both instances, far toward the equatorial regions. His observations in Europe, in North America, and in Brazil seemed here to have their closing chapter.

With these facts in his mind, he did not fail to pause before Glacier Bay, noted for its immense glacier, which seems, as seen from the main channel, to plunge sheer down into the waters of the bay. A boat party was soon formed to accompany him to the glacier. It proved less easy of access than it looked at a distance. A broad belt of wood, growing, as Agassiz afterward found, on an accumulation of old terminal moraines, spanned the lower valley from side to side. Through this wood there poured a glacial river, emptying itself into the bay. Strange to say, this glacier-washed forest, touching the ice on one side and the sea on the other, was full of flowers. The red bells of the glossy-leaved Desfontainia, the lovely pink blossoms of the Phylesia, the crimson berries of the Pennetia, stood out in bright relief from a background of mossy tree-trunks and rocks. After an hour's walking, made laborious by the spongy character of the ground,—a mixture of loose soil and decaying vegetation, in which one sank knee-deep,—the gleam of the ice began to shimmer through the trees; and issuing from the wood, the party found themselves in front of a glacier wall, stretching across the whole valley and broken into deep rifts, caves, and crevasses of dark blue ice. The glacier was actually about a mile wide; but as the central portion was pressed forward in advance of the sides, the whole front was not presented at once. It formed a sharp crescent, with the curve turned outward. One of the caves in this front wall was some thirty or forty feet high, about a hundred feet deep, and two or three yards wide at the entrance. At the further end it narrowed to a mere gallery, where the roof was pierced by a circular window, quite symmetrical in shape, through which one looked up to the blue sky and drifting clouds. There must be strange effects in this ice-cavern, when the sun is high and sends a shaft of light through its one window to illuminate the interior.

This first excursion was a mere reconnaissance. An approximate idea of the dimensions of the glacier, and some details of its structure, were obtained on a second visit the following day. The anchorage for the night was in Playa Parda Cove, one of the most beautiful of the many beautiful harbors of the Magellan Strait. It is entered by a deep, narrow slit, cut into the mountains on the northern side of the Strait, and widening at its farther end into a kind of pocket or basin, hemmed in between rocky walls bordered by forests, and overhung by snow and ice-fields. The next morning at half-past three o'clock, just as moonlight was fading before the dawn, and the mountains were touched with the coming day, the reveille was sounded for those who were to return to Glacier Bay. This time Agassiz divided his force so that they could act independently of each other, though under a general plan laid out by him. M. de Pourtales and Dr. Steindachner ascended the mountain to the left of the valley, following its ridge, in the hope of reaching a position from which they could discover the source and the full length of the glacier. In this they did not succeed, though M. de Pourtales estimated its length, as far as he could see from any one point, to be about three miles, beyond which it was lost in the higher range. It made part of a net-work of glaciers running back into a large massif of mountains, and fed by many a neve on their upper slopes. The depth as well as the length of this glacier remains somewhat problematical, and indeed all the estimates in so cursory a survey must be considered as approximations rather than positive results. The glazed surface of the ice is an impediment to any examination from the upper side. It would be impossible to spring from brink to brink of a crevasse, as is so constantly done by explorers of Alpine glaciers where the edges of the cracks are often snowy or granular. Here the edges of the crevasses are sharp and hard, and to spring across one of any size would be almost certain death. There is no hold for an Alpine stock, no grappling point for hands or feet. Any investigation from the upper surface would, therefore, require special apparatus, and much more time than Agassiz and his party could give. Neither was an approach from the side very easy. The glacier arches so much in the centre, and slopes away so steeply, that when one is in the lateral depression between it and the mountain, one faces an almost perpendicular wall of ice, which blocks the vision completely. M. de Pourtales measured one of the crevasses in this wall, and found that it had a depth of some seventy feet. Judging from the remarkable convexity of the glacier, it can hardly be less in the centre than two or three times its thickness on the edges, —something over two hundred feet, therefore. Probably none of these glaciers of the Strait of Magellan are as thick as those of Switzerland, though they are often much broader. The mountains are not so high, the valleys not so deep, as in the Alps; the ice is consequently not packed into such confined troughs. By some of the party an attempt was made to ascertain the rate of movement, signals having been adjusted the day before for its measurement. During the middle of the day, it advanced at the rate of ten inches and a fraction in five hours. One such isolated observation is of course of little comparative value. For himself, Agassiz reserved the study of the bay, the ancient bed of the glacier in its former extension. He spent the day in cruising about the bay in the steam-launch, landing at every point he wished to investigate. His first care was to examine minutely the valley walls over which the glacier must once have moved. Every characteristic feature, known in the Alps as the work of the glaciers, was not only easily recognizable here, but as perfectly preserved as anywhere in Switzerland. The rounded knolls to which De Saussure first gave the name of roches moutonnees were smoothed, polished, scratched, and grooved in the direction of the ice movement, the marks running mostly from south to north, or nearly so. The general trend of the scratches and furrows showed them to have been continuous from one knoll to another. The furrows were of various dimensions, sometimes shallow and several inches broad, sometimes narrow with more defined limits, gradually passing into mere lines on a very smoothly polished surface. Even the curious notches scooped out of the even surfaces, and technically called "coups de gouge," were not wanting. In some places the seams of harder rock stood out for a quarter of an inch or so above adjoining decomposed surfaces; in such instances the dike alone retained the glacial marks, which had been worn away from the softer rock.

The old moraines were numerous and admirably well preserved. Agassiz examined with especial care one colossal lateral moraine, standing about two miles below the present terminus of the ice and five hundred feet above the sea-level. It consisted of the same rocks as those found on the present terminal moraine, part of them being rounded and worn, while large, angular boulders rested above the smaller materials. This moraine forms a dam across a trough in the valley wall, and holds back the waters of a beautiful lake, about a thousand feet in length and five hundred in width, shutting it in just as the Lake of Meril in Switzerland is held in its basin by the glacier of Aletsch. There are erratics some two or three hundred feet above this great moraine, showing that the glacier must have been more than five hundred feet thick when it left this accumulation of loose materials at such a height. It then united, however, with a large glacier more to the west. Its greatest thickness, as an independent glacier, is no doubt marked, not by the boulders lying higher up, but by the large moraine which shuts in the lake. The direct connection of this moraine with the glacier in its former extension is still further shown by two other moraines, on lower levels and less perfect, but having the same relation to the present terminus of the ice. The lower of these is only one hundred and fifty feet above the actual level of the glacier. These three moraines occur on the western slope of the bay. The eastern slope is more broken, and while the rounded knolls are quite as distinct and characteristic, the erratics are more loosely scattered over the surface. In mineralogical character they agree with those on the western wall of the bay. Upon the summits of some small islands at the entrance of the bay, there are also some remnants of terminal moraines, formed by the glacier when it reached the main channel; that is, when it was some three miles longer than now.

The more recent oscillations, marking the advance and retreat of the glacier within certain limits, are shown by the successive moraines heaped up in advance of the present terminal wall. The central motion here, as in all the Swiss glaciers, is greater than the lateral, the ice being pushed forward in the middle faster than on the sides. But there would seem to be more than one axis of progression in this broad mass of ice; for though the centre is pushed out beyond the rest, the terminal wall does not present one uniform curve, but forms a number of more or less projecting angles or folds. A few feet in front of this wall is a ridge of loose materials, stones, pebbles, and boulders, repeating exactly the outline of the ice where it now stands; a few feet in advance of this, again, is another ridge precisely like it; still a few feet beyond, another; and so on, for four or five concentric zigzag crescent-shaped moraines, followed by two others more or less marked, till they fade into the larger morainic mass, upon which stands the belt of wood dividing the present glacier from the bay. Agassiz counted eight distinct moraines between the glacier and the belt of wood, and four concentric moraines in the wood itself. It is plain that the glacier has ploughed into the forest within some not very remote period, for the trees along its margin are loosened and half uprooted, though not yet altogether decayed. In the presence of the glacier one ceases to wonder at the effects produced by so powerful an agent. This sheet of ice, even in its present reduced extent, is about a mile in width, several miles in length, and at least two hundred feet in depth. Moving forward as it does ceaselessly, and armed below with a gigantic file, consisting of stones, pebbles, and gravel, firmly set in the ice, who can wonder that it should grind, furrow, round, and polish the surfaces over which it slowly drags its huge weight. At once destroyer and fertilizer, it uproots and blights hundreds of trees in its progress, yet feeds a forest at its feet with countless streams; it grinds the rocks to powder in its merciless mill, and then sends them down, a fructifying soil, to the wooded shore below.

Agassiz would gladly have stayed longer in the neighborhood of Glacier Bay, and have made it the central point of a more detailed examination of the glacial phenomena in the Strait. But the southern winter was opening, and already gave signs of its approach. At dawn on the 26th of March, therefore, the Hassler left her beautiful anchorage in Playa Parda Cove, six large glaciers being in sight from her deck as she came out. The scenery during the morning had a new scientific interest for Agassiz, because the vessel kept along the northern side of the Strait, while the course hitherto had been nearer the southern shore. He could thus better compare the differences between the two walls of the Strait. The fact that the northern wall is more evenly worn, more rounded than the southern, had a special significance for him, as corresponding with like facts in Switzerland, and showing that the ice-sheet had advanced across the Strait with greater force in its ascending than in its descending path. The north side being the strike side, the ice would have pushed against it with greater force. Such a difference between the two sides of any hollow or depression in the direct path of the ice is well known in Switzerland.

Later in the day, a pause was made in Chorocua Bay, where Captain Mayne's chart makes mention of a glacier descending into the water. There is, indeed, a large glacier on its western side, but so inaccessible, that any examination of it would have required days rather than hours. No one, however, regretted the afternoon spent here, for the bay was singularly beautiful. On either side, deep gorges, bordered by richly-wooded cliffs and overhung by ice and snow-fields, were cut into the mountains. Where these channels might lead, into what dim recesses of ocean and mountain, could only be conjectured. The bay, with all its inlets and fiords, was still as a church. Voices and laughter seemed an intrusion, and a louder shout came back in echoes from far-off hidden retreats. Only the swift steamer-ducks, as they shot across, broke the glassy surface of the water with their arrow-like wake. From this point the Hassler crossed to Sholl Bay, and anchored at the entrance of Smythe's Channel. As sunset faded over the snow mountains opposite her anchorage, their white reflection lay like marble in the water.

CHAPTER 24.

1872: AGE 65.

Picnic in Sholl Bay. Fuegians. Smythe's Channel. Comparison of Glacial Features with those of the Strait of Magellan. Ancud. Port of San Pedro. Bay of Concepcion. Three Weeks in Talcahuana. Collections. Geology. Land Journey to Santiago. Scenes along the Road. Report on Glacial Features to Mr. Peirce. Arrival at Santiago. Election as Foreign Associate of the Institute of France. Valparaiso. The Galapagos. Geological and Zoological Features. Arrival at San Francisco.

The next day forces were divided. The vessel put out into the Strait again for sounding and dredging, while Agassiz, with a smaller party, landed in Sholl Bay. Here, after having made a fire and pitched a tent in which to deposit wraps, provisions etc., the company dispersed in various directions along the shore, geologizing, botanizing, and collecting. Agassiz was especially engaged in studying the structure of the beach itself. He found that the ridge of the beach was formed by a glacial moraine, while accumulations of boulders, banked up in morainic ridges, concentric with one another and with the beach moraine, extended far out from the shore like partly sunken reefs. The pebbles and boulders of these ridges were not local, or, at least, only partially so; they had the same geological character as those of the drift material throughout the Strait.

The day was favorable for work, and there was little to remind one of approaching winter. A creek of fresh water, that ran out upon one part of the beach, led up to a romantic brook, rushing down through a gorge bordered by moss-grown trees and carpeted by ferns and lichens in all its nooks and corners. This brook took its rise in a small lake lying some half a mile behind the beach. The collections made along the shore in this excursion were large and various: star-fish, volutas, sea-urchins, sea-anemones, medusae, doris; many small fishes, also, from the tide-pools, beside a number drawn in the seine.

Later in the day, when the party had assembled around the beach fire for rest and refreshment, before returning to the vessel, their lunch was interrupted by strange and unexpected guests. A boat rounded the point of the beach, and, as it came nearer, proved to be full of Fuegian natives, men, women, children, and dogs, their invariable companions. The men alone landed, some six or seven in number, and came toward the tent. Nothing could be more coarse and repulsive than their appearance, in which the brutality of the savage was in no way redeemed by physical strength or manliness. They were almost naked, for the short, loose skins tied around the neck, and hanging from the shoulders, over the back, partly to the waist, could hardly be called clothing. With swollen bodies, thin limbs, and stooping forms; with a childish, yet cunning, leer on their faces, they crouched over the fire, spreading their hands toward its genial warmth, and all shrieking at once, "Tabac! tabac!" and "Galleta!"—biscuit. Tobacco there was none; but the remains of the lunch, such as it was,—hard bread and pork,—was distributed among them, and they greedily devoured it. Then the one who, judging from a certain deference paid him by the others, might be the chief, or leader, seated himself on a stone and sang in a singular kind of monotonous, chanting tone. The words, as interpreted by the gestures and expressions, seemed to be an improvisation concerning the strangers they had found upon the beach, and were evidently addressed to them. There was something curious in the character of this Fuegian song. Rather recitative than singing, the measure had, nevertheless, certain divisions or pauses, as if to mark a kind of rhythm. It was brought to a close at regularly recurring intervals, and ended always in the same way, and on the same note, with a rising inflection of the voice. When the song was finished, a certain surprise and expectancy in the listeners kept them silent. This seemed to trouble the singer, who looked round with a comical air of inquiring disappointment. Thus reminded, the audience were quick to applaud, and then he laughed with pleasure, imitated the clapping of the hands in an awkward way, and nothing loth, began to sing again.

The recall gun from the Hassler brought this strange scene to a close, and the party hastened down to the beach, closely followed by their guests, who still clamorously demanded tobacco. Meanwhile the women had brought the boat close to that of the Hassler at the landing. They all began to laugh, talk, and gesticulate, and seemed a noisy grew, chattering unceasingly, with amazing rapidity, and all together. Their boat, with the babies and dogs to add to the tumult, was a perfect babel of voices. They put off at once, keeping as close as they could to the Hassler boat, and reaching the vessel almost at the same time. They were not allowed to come on board, but tobacco and biscuit, as well as bright calico and beads for the women, were thrown down to them. They scrambled and snatched fiercely, like wild animals, for whatever they could catch. They had some idea of barter, for when they found they had received all that they were likely to get gratuitously, they held up bows and arrows, wicker baskets, birds, and the large sea-urchins, which are an article of food with them. Even after the steamer had started, they still clung to the side, praying, shrieking, screaming, for more "tabac." When they found it a hopeless chase, they dropped off, and began again the same chanting recitative, waving their hands in farewell.

Always interested in the comparative study of the races, Agassiz regretted that he had no other opportunity of observing the natives of this region and comparing them with the Indians he had seen elsewhere, in Brazil and in the United States. It is true that he and his companions, when on shore, frequently came upon their deserted camps, or single empty huts; and their canoes followed the Hassler several times, but never when it was convenient to stop and let them come up with the vessel. This particular set were not in a canoe, but in a large boat of English build. Probably they had stolen it, or had found it, perhaps, stranded on the shore. They are usually, however, in canoes of their own making. One can only wonder that people ingenious enough to construct canoes so well modeled and so neatly and strongly put together, should have invented nothing better in the way of a house than a hut built of flexible branches, compared with which a wigwam is an elaborate dwelling. These huts are hood-like in shape, and too low for any posture but that of squatting or lying down. In front is always a scorched spot on the ground, where their handful of fire has smouldered; and at one side, a large heap of empty shells, showing that they had occupied this place until they had exhausted the supply of mussels, on which they chiefly live. When this is the case, they move to some other spot, gather a few branches, reconstruct their frail shelter, and continue the same life. Untaught by their necessities, they wander thus, naked and homeless, in snow, mist, and rain, as they have done for ages, asking of the land only a strip of beach and a handful of fire; and of the ocean, shell-fish enough to save them from starvation.

The Hassler had now fairly entered upon Smythe's Channel, and was anchored at evening (March 27th) in Otway Bay, a lake-like harbor, broken by islands. Mount Burney, a noble, snow-covered mountain, corresponding to Mount Sarmiento in grandeur of outline, was in full view, but was partially veiled in mist. On the following day, however, the weather was perfect for the sail past Sarmiento Range and Snowy Glacier, which were in sight all day. Blue could not be more deep and pure, nor white more spotless, than their ice and snow-fields. Toward the latter part of the day, an immense expanse of snow opened out a little beyond Snowy Range. It was covered with the most curious snow hummocks, forming high cones over the whole surface, their shadows slanting over the glittering snow in the afternoon sunshine. They were most fantastic in shape, and some fifty or sixty in number. At first sight, they resembled heaped-up mounds or pyramids of snow; but as the vessel approached, one group of them, so combined as to simulate a fortification, showed a face of rock where the snow had been blown away, and it seemed therefore probable that all were alike,—snow-covered pinnacles of rock.

The evening anchorage on the 28th was in Mayne's Harbor, a pretty inlet of Owen's Island. Here the vessel was detained for twenty-four hours by the breaking of the reversing rod. The engineers repaired it to the best of their ability, with such apparatus as they had, but it was a source of anxiety till a port was reached where a new one could be supplied. The detention, had it not been for such a cause, was welcome to the scientific party. Agassiz found the rounded and moutonnees surfaces and the general modeling of the outlines of ice no less marked here than in the Strait; and in a ramble over the hills above the anchorage, M. de Pourtales came upon very distinct glacial scorings and furrows on dikes and ledges of greenstone and syenite. They were perfectly regular, and could be connected by their trend from ledge to ledge, across intervening spaces of softer decomposed rock, from which all such surface markings had disappeared.

The country above Mayne's Harbor was pretty, though somewhat barren. Beyond the narrow belt of woods bordering the shore, the walking was over soggy hummocks, with little growth upon them except moss, lichens, and coarse marsh grass. These were succeeded by ridges of crumbling rock, between which were numerous small lakes. The land seemed very barren of life. Even the shores of the ponds were hardly inhabited. No song of bird or buzz of insect broke the stillness. Rock after rock was turned over in the vain expectation of finding living things on the damp under side at least; and the cushions of moss were broken up in the same fruitless chase. All was barren and lifeless. Not so on the shore, where the collecting went on rapidly. Dredge and nets were at work all the morning, and abundant collections were made also from the little nooks and inlets of the beach. Agassiz found two new jelly-fishes, and christened them at once as the locality suggested, one for Captain Mayne, the other for Professor Owen. Near the shore, birds also seemed more abundant. A pair of kelp-geese and a steamer duck were brought in, and one of the officers reported humming-birds flitting across the brook from which the Hassler's tanks were filled.

Early on the morning of the 30th, while mountains and snow-fields, woodland and water, still lay between moonlight and sunrise, the Hassler started for Tarn Bay. It was a beautiful Easter Sunday, with very little wind, and a soft sky, broken by few clouds. But such beginnings are too apt to be delusive in this region of wet and fog, and a heavy rain, with thick mist, came up in the afternoon. That night, for the first time, the Hassler missed her anchorage, and lay off the shore near an island, which afforded some protection from the wind. A forlorn hope was detailed to the shore, where a large fire was kept burning all night, that the vessel might not lose her bearings and drift away. In the morning all was right again, and she kept on her course to Rowlet Narrows.

This passage is formed by a deep gorge, cleft between lofty walls over which many a waterfall foams from reservoirs of snow above. Agassiz observed two old glacier beds on the western side of the pass—two shallow depressions, lying arid and scored between swelling wooded ridges. He had not met in all the journey a better locality for the study of glacial effects than here. The sides of the channel show these traces throughout their whole length. In this same neighborhood, as a conspicuous foreground on the shore of Indian Reach, to the south of Lackawanna Cove, is a large moraine resembling the "horse-backs," in the State of Maine, New England. The top was as level as a railroad embankment. The anchorage for the night was in Eden Harbor, and for that evening, at least, it was lovely enough to deserve its name. The whole expanse of its land-locked waters, held between mountains and broken by islands, was rosy and purple in the setting sun. The gates of the garden were closed, however, not by a flaming sword, but by an impenetrable forest, along the edge of which a scanty rim of beach hardly afforded landing or foothold. The collections here, therefore, were small; but a good haul was made with the trawl net, which gathered half-a-dozen species of echinoderms, some small fishes, and a number of shells. Fog detained the vessel in Eden Harbor till a late hour in the morning, but the afternoon was favorable for the passage through the English Narrows, the most contracted part of Smythe's Channel. It is, indeed, a mere mountain defile, through which the water rushes with such force that, in navigating it, great care was required to keep the vessel off the rocks. Her anchorage at the close of the day was in Connor's Cove, a miniature harbor not unlike Borja Bay in the Strait. It was a tranquil retreat. The water-birds seemed to find it so, for the steamer ducks were trailing their long wakes through the water, and a large kind of stormy petrel sailed up to the vessel, and almost put himself into the hands of the sailors, with whom he remained an unresisting prisoner.

Geologically, Agassiz found Connor's Cove of especial interest. It runs east and west, opening on the eastern side of the channel; but the knolls, that is to say, the rounded surfaces at its entrance, are furrowed across the cove, at right angles with it. In other words, the movement of the ice, always from south to north, has been with Smythe's Channel, and across the Strait of Magellan. Indeed it seemed to Agassiz that all the glacial agency in Smythe's Channel, the trend of the furrows, the worn surfaces whereon they were to be found, and the steepness of southern exposures as compared with the more rounded opposite slopes, pointed to the same conclusion.

On the third of April Agassiz left with regret this region of ocean and mountain, glacier, snow-field, and forest. The weeks he had spent there were all too short for the work he had hoped to do. Yet, trained as he was in glacial phenomena, even so cursory an observation satisfied him that in the southern, as in the northern hemisphere, the present glaciers are but a remnant of the ancient ice-period.

After two days of open sea and head winds, the next anchorage was in Port San Pedro, a very beautiful bay opening on the north side of Corcovado Gulf, with snow mountains in full sight; the Peak of Corcovado and a wonderfully symmetrical volcanic mountain, Melimoya, white as purest marble to the summit, were clearly defined against the sky. Forests clothed the shore on every side, and the shelving beach met the wood in a bank of wild Bromelia, most brilliant in color. Not only were excellent collections made on this beach, but the shore was strewn with large accumulations of erratics. Among them was a green epidotic rock which Agassiz had traced to this spot from the Bay of San Antonio on the Patagonian coast, without ever finding it in place. Some of the larger boulders had glacial furrows and scratches upon them, and all the hills bordering the shore were rounded and moutonnee. One of the great charms for Agassiz in the scenery of all this region, and especially in the Strait of Magellan, was a kind of home feeling that it gave him. Although the mountains rose from the ocean, instead of from the plain as in Switzerland, yet the snow-fields and the glaciers carried him back to his youth. To him, the sunset of this evening in the Port San Pedro, with the singular transparent rose color over the snow mountains, and the soft succeeding pallor, was the very reproduction of an Alpine sunset.

The next morning brought a disappointment. From this point Agassiz had hoped to continue the voyage by the inside passage between the main-land and the island of Chiloe. This was of importance to him, on account of its geological relation to Smythe's Channel and the Strait of Magellan. In the absence of any good charts of the channel, the Captain, after examining the shoals at the entrance, was forced to decide, almost as much to his own regret as to that of Agassiz, not to attempt the further passage. Keeping up the outer coast of Chiloe, therefore, the vessel anchored before Ancud on the 8th of April. It was a heavenly day. The volcanic peak of Osorno and the whole snowy Cordilleras were unveiled. The little town above the harbor, with its outlying farms on the green and fertile hills around, seemed like the very centre of civilization to people who had been so long out of the world. It is said to rain in Ancud three hundred and sixty-five days in the year. But on this particular afternoon it was a very sunny place, and the inhabitants seemed to avail themselves of their rare privilege. Groups of Indians, who had come across the river in the morning to sell their milk in the town, were resting in picturesque groups around their empty milk-cans, the women wrapped in their long shawls, the men in their ponchos and slouched hats; the country people were driving out their double teams of strong, powerful oxen harnessed to wooden troughs filled with manure for the fields; the washerwomen were scrubbing and beating their linen along the roadside; the gardens of the poorest houses were bright with large shrubs of wild fuchsia, and, altogether, the aspect of the little place was cheerful and pretty. Agassiz had but two or three hours for a look at the geology. Even this cursory glance sufficed to show him that the drift materials, even to their special mineralogical elements, were the same as in the Magellan Strait. Here they rested, however, on volcanic soil.

Stopping at Lota for coal, but not long enough for any scientific work, the Hassler entered Concepcion Bay on the 15th April, and anchored near Talcahuana, where she was to remain some three weeks for the repair of her engine. This quaint, primitive little town is built upon one of the finest harbors on the Pacific coast. Agassiz was fortunate in finding, through the kindness of Captain Johnson, a partially furnished house, where several large vacant rooms, opening on the "patio," served admirably as scientific laboratories. Here, then, he established himself with his assistants. It was soon understood that every living thing would find a market with him, and all the idle urchins about the town flocked to the house with specimens. An unceasing traffic of birds, shells, fish, etc., went on there from morning to night, and to the various vendors were added groups of Indians coming to have their photographs taken. There were charming excursions and walks in the neighborhood, and the geology of the region was so interesting that it determined Agassiz to go by land from Talcahuana to Valparaiso, on a search after any glacial tracks that might be found in the valley lying between the Cordillera of the Andes and the Coast Range. Meanwhile the Hassler was to go on a dredging expedition to the island of Juan Fernandez, and then proceed to Valparaiso, where Agassiz was to join her a fortnight later. Although this expedition was under the patronage of the Coast Survey, the generosity of Mr. Thayer, so constantly extended to scientific aims, had followed Agassiz on this second journey. To his kindness he owed the possibility of organizing an excursion apart from the direct object of the voyage. This change of plan and its cause is told in the following extract from his general report to Professor Peirce:—

APRIL 27th.

While I was transcribing my Report, Pourtales came in with the statement that he had noticed the first indication of an Andean glacier in the vicinity. I have visited the locality twice since. It is a magnificent polished surface, as well preserved as any I have ever seen upon old glaciated ground or under glaciers of the present day, with well-marked furrows and scratches. Think of it! a characteristic surface, indicating glacier action, in latitude 37 degrees south, at the level of the sea! The place is only a few feet above tide level, upon the slope of a hill on which stand the ruins of a Spanish fort, near the fishermen's huts of San Vicente, which lies between Concepcion Bay and the Bay of Aranco. Whether the polished surface is the work of a glacier descending from the Andes to the sea-shore or not, I have not yet been able to determine. I find no volcanic pebbles or boulders in this vicinity, which, after my experience in San Carlos, I should expect all along the shore, if the glaciers of the Andes had descended to the level of the ocean, in this part of the country. The erratics here have the character of those observed farther south. It is true the furrows and scratches of this polished surface run mainly from east to west; but there are some crossing the main trend, at angles ranging from 20 to 30 degrees, and running south-east-north-west. Moreover, the magnetic variation is 18 degrees 3 degrees at Talcahuano April 23rd, the true meridian bearing to the right of the magnetic. I shall soon know what to make of this, as I start to-morrow for the interior, to go to Santiago and join the ship again at Valparaiso. I have hired a private carriage, to be able to stop whenever I wish so to do. I also take a small seine to fish for fresh water fishes in the many streams intervening between this place and Valparaiso. The trend of the glacial scratches in San Vicente reminds me of a fact I have often observed in New England near the sea-shore, where the glacial furrows dip to a considerable extent eastward toward the deep ocean, while further inland their trend is more regular and due North and South. . .

"I had almost forgotten to say that I have obtained unquestionable evidence of the cretaceous age of the coal deposits of Lota and the adjoining localities, north and south, which are generally supposed to be tertiary lignites. They are overlaid by sandstone containing Baculites! I need not adduce other evidence to satisfy geologists of the correctness of my assertion. I have myself collected a great many of these fossils, in beds resting upon coal-seams. Ever truly yours,

LOUIS AGASSIZ."

On the 28th of April, then, Agassiz left Talcahuana, accompanied by Mrs. Agassiz, and by Dr. Steindachner, who was to assist him in making collections along the way. They were to travel post, along the diligence road, until they reached Curicu, within half a day of Santiago, where railroad travel began. It was a beautiful journey, and though the rainy season was impending, the fair weather was uninterrupted. The way lay for the most part through an agricultural district of corn, wheat, and vineyards. In this strange land, where seasons are reversed, and autumn has changed places with spring, the work of harvest and vintage was just going on. The road was full of picturesque scenes: troops of mules might be met, a hundred at a time, laden with corn-sacks; the queer, primitive carts of the country creaked along, carrying huge wine-jars filled with the fresh new juice of the grape; the road was gay with country people in their holiday dresses; the women, who wore their bright shawls like a kind of mantle, were sometimes on foot and sometimes pillioned behind the men, who were invariably on horseback, and whose brilliant ponchos and fine riding added to the impression of life and color. Rivers and streams were frequent; and as there were no bridges, the scenes at the fords, sometimes crossed on rafts, sometimes on flat boats, worked by ropes, were exciting and picturesque. For rustic interiors along the road side, there were the huts of the working people, rough trellises of tree-trunks interwoven with branches; green as arbors while fresh, a coarse thatch when dry. There was always a large open space in front, sheltered by the projecting thatch of the house, and furnished sometimes with a rough table and benches. Here would be the women at their work, or the children at play, or sometimes the drovers taking their lunch of tortillas and wine, while their animals munched their midday meal hard by. The scenery was often fine. On the third day the fertile soil, watered by many rivers, was exchanged for a sandy plain, broken by a thorny mimosa scattered over the surface. This plain lay between the Cordillera of the Andes and the Coast Range. As the road advanced farther inland, the panorama of the Cordilleras became more and more striking. In the glow of the sunset, the peaks of the abrupt, jagged walls and the volcano-like summits were defined against the sky in all their rugged beauty. There was little here to remind one of the loveliness of the Swiss Alps. With no lower green slopes, no soft pasturage grounds leading gently up to rocky heights, the Andes, at least in this part of their range, rise arid, stern, and bold from base to crest, a fortress wall unbroken by tree or shrub, or verdure of any kind, and relieved only by the rich and varied coloring of the rock.