Louis Agassiz as a Teacher | Page 4

the 13th of
November, 1860. The transfer of the collections to their new and safe
abode was made as rapidly as possible, and the work of developing the
institution under these more favorable conditions moved steadily on.
The lecture-rooms were at once opened, not only to students, but to
other persons not connected with the University. Especially welcome
were teachers of schools, for whom admittance was free. It was a great
pleasure to Agassiz thus to renew and strengthen his connection with
the teachers of the State, with whom, from the time of his arrival in this
country, he had held most cordial relations, attending the Teachers'
Institutes, visiting the normal schools, and associating himself actively,
as far as he could, with the interests of public education in
Massachusetts. From this time forward his college lectures were open
to women as well as to men. He had great sympathy with the desire of
women for larger and more various fields of study and work, and a
certain number of women have always been employed as assistants at
the Museum.
The story of the next three years was one of unceasing but seemingly
uneventful work. The daylight hours from nine or ten o'clock in the
morning were spent, with the exception of the hour devoted to the
school, at the Museum, not only in personal researches and in lecturing,
but in organizing, distributing, and superintending the work of the
laboratories, all of which was directed by him. Passing from bench to
bench, from table to table, with a suggestion here, a kindly but
scrutinizing glance there, he made his sympathetic presence felt by the
whole establishment. No man ever exercised a more genial personal
influence over his students and assistants.
His initiatory steps in teaching special students of natural history were
not a little discouraging. Observation and comparison being in his
opinion the intellectual tools most indispensable to the naturalist, his
first lesson was one in looking. He gave no assistance; he simply left

his student with the specimen, telling him to use his eyes diligently, and
report upon what he saw. He returned from time to time to inquire after
the beginner's progress, but he never asked him a leading question,
never pointed out a single feature of the structure, never prompted an
inference or a conclusion. This process lasted sometimes for days, the
professor requiring the pupil not only to distinguish the various parts of
the animal, but to detect also the relation of these details to more
general typical features. His students still retain amusing reminiscences
of their despair when thus confronted with their single specimen; no aid
to be had from outside until they had wrung from it the secret of its
structure. But all of them have recognized the fact that this one lesson
in looking, which forced them to such careful scrutiny of the object
before them, influenced all their subsequent habits of observation,
whatever field they might choose for their special subject of study....
But if Agassiz, in order to develop independence and accuracy of
observation, threw his students on their own resources at first, there
was never a more generous teacher in the end than he. All his
intellectual capital was thrown open to his pupils. His original material,
his unpublished investigations, his most precious specimens, his
drawings and illustrations were at their command. This liberality led in
itself to a serviceable training, for he taught them to use with respect
the valuable, often unique, objects entrusted to their care. Out of the
intellectual good-fellowship which he established and encouraged in
the laboratory grew the warmest relations between his students and
himself. Many of them were deeply attached to him, and he was
extremely dependent upon their sympathy and affection. By some
among them he will never be forgotten. He is still their teacher and
their friend, scarcely more absent from their work now than when the
glow of his enthusiasm made itself felt in his personal presence.

IV
HOW AGASSIZ TAUGHT PROFESSOR SHALER
[Footnote: From The Autobiography of Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, pp.
93-100. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1907.]
At the time of my secession from the humanities, Agassiz was in
Europe; he did not return, I think, until the autumn of 1859. I had,
however, picked up several acquaintances among his pupils, learned

what they were about, and gained some notion of his methods. After
about a month he returned, and I had my first contact with the man who
was to have the most influence on my life of any of the teachers to
whom I am indebted. I shall never forget even the lesser incidents of
this meeting, for this great master by his presence gave an importance
to his surroundings, so that the room where you met him, and the