Louis Agassiz as a Teacher | Page 6

At that time,
the instructors had, in addition to their meagre salaries--his was then
$2,500 per annum,--the regular fees paid in by the students under his
charge. So I was promptly assured that I was admitted. Be it said,
however, that he did give me an effective oral examination, which, as

he told me, was intended to show whether I could expect to go forward
to a degree at the end of four years of study. On this matter of the
degree he was obdurate, refusing to recommend some who had been
with him for many years, and had succeeded in their special work,
giving as reason for his denial that they were 'too ignorant.'
The examination Agassiz gave me was directed first to find that I knew
enough Latin and Greek to make use of those languages; that I could
patter a little of them evidently pleased him. He didn't care for those
detestable rules for scanning. Then came German and French, which
were also approved: I could read both, and spoke the former fairly well.
He did not probe me in my weakest place, mathematics, for the good
reason that, badly as I was off in that subject, he was in a worse plight.
Then asking me concerning my reading, he found that I had read the
Essay on Classification, and had noted in it the influence of Schelling's
views. Most of his questioning related to this field, and the more than
fair beginning of our relations then made was due to the fact that I had
some enlargement on that side. So, too, he was pleased to find that I
had managed a lot of Latin, Greek, and German poetry, and had been
trained with the sword. He completed this inquiry by requiring that I
bring my foils and masks for a bout. In this test he did not fare well, for,
though not untrained, he evidently knew more of the Schlager than of
the rapier. He was heavy-handed, and lacked finesse. This, with my
previous experience, led me to the conclusion that I had struck upon a
kind of tutor in Cambridge not known in Kentucky.
While Agassiz questioned me carefully as to what I had read and what I
had seen, he seemed in this preliminary going over in no wise
concerned to find what I knew about fossils, rocks, animals, and plants;
he put aside the offerings of my scanty lore. This offended me a bit, as I
recall, for the reason that I thought I knew, and for a self-taught lad
really did know, a good deal about such matters, especially as to the
habits of insects, particularly spiders. It seemed hard to be denied the
chance to make my parade; but I afterward saw what this meant--that
he did not intend to let me begin my tasks by posing as a naturalist. The
beginning was indeed quite different, and, as will be seen, in a manner
that quickly evaporated my conceit. It was made and continued in a
way I will now recount.
Agassiz's laboratory was then in a rather small two-storied building,

looking much like a square dwelling-house, which stood where the
College Gymnasium now stands.... Agassiz had recently moved into it
from a shed on the marsh near Brighton bridge, the original tenants, the
engineers, having come to riches in the shape of the brick structure now
known as the Lawrence Building. In this primitive establishment
Agassiz's laboratory, as distinguished from the storerooms where the
collections were crammed, occupied one room about thirty feet long
and fifteen feet wide--what is now the west room on the lower floor of
the edifice. In this place, already packed, I had assigned to me a small
pine table with a rusty tin pan upon it....
When I sat me down before my tin pan, Agassiz brought me a small
fish, placing it before me with the rather stern requirement that I should
study it, but should on no account talk to any one concerning it, nor
read anything relating to fishes, until I had his permission so to do. To
my inquiry, 'What shall I do?' he said in effect: 'Find out what you can
without damaging the specimen; when I think that you have done the
work I will question you.' In the course of an hour I thought I had
compassed that fish; it was rather an unsavory object, giving forth the
stench of old alcohol, then loathsome to me, though in time I came to
like it. Many of the scales were loosened so that they fell off. It
appeared to me to be a case for a summary report, which I was anxious
to make and get on to the next stage of the business. But Agassiz,
though always within call,