Well, Louis John Rudolph, when he was quite a boy, was chosen by some scientific men to study out the story of some fishes that were brought from the Amazon River. You see he must have
had a good name as a student, or this honor would never have come to him. It seems he did his work well, and became so interested that he went on studying fishes. When he was about twenty-one, he began to write papers about their curious and wonderful varieties, which showed so much knowledge that scholars began to get very much interested in the student, as well as in his fishes. As the years went by, and the boy became a man and was called Mr. Agassiz, he became known all over the world for his knowledge in this direction; he grew more and more interested. He found fishes everywhere. Fossil fishes next began to interest him. What are they? Why, fishes turned to stone. He found them among the rocks of Switzerland. Very little was known about them. Agassiz undertook to find out all he could. I have not time, nor room, to tell you the story of his long hard years of work. I can only tell you that he succeeded. His name is great, because he has been a great helper to students. It is great for another reason. The more he studied the wonderful works of God, the more he seemed to learn to love and trust God. The more he read of the rocks, and the bones, scattered over the earth, the more
sure he was that the Bible was true. He came to our own country when he was not much over thirty years old, and lived there for the rest of his life; always studying, and teaching others. He became a professor in Cambridge University, where he helped to build a monument for himself in the Museum of Natural History which has helped and is helping so many students. He was not an old man when he died—only about sixty-six years; but he did more work in those years than most men accomplish who live to be eighty.
CHAPTER IV.
BACON, FRANCIS.
When I was a girl in school, the teacher used to give out topics once a month for essays. One evening she gave to Fanny Rhodes this topic—"Bacon." Poor Fannie hated essays worse than any of the others, I believe, and over this subject she fairly groaned. "As if I could!" she said. But she did. In just a month from the day the subjects were given out, the essays were to be read. Fanny was among the first to be called forward. I ought to tell you that these monthly essays were not passed in for correction until after they were read. They were to be given to the school exactly as they came from the author's hand. So Fannie began:
BACON.
The subject assigned to me for this month is bacon. I do not see how it is possible for any
one to say much on such a subject. Everybody knows all that there is to say about it. It is simply the flesh of hogs, salted, or pickled, or dried.