Of him the Boston Globe said: “We should think the heart of every schoolmaster and schoolmistress in the land should bound at reading this simple announcement. The great naturalist, the peer of Aristotle, Linnæus, Cuvier, and Von Baer, calls himself, in the most solemn of all documents, ‘a teacher.’ There is, to us, something inspiring in this designation. All teachers, whether they are professors in colleges or directors in the commonest village schools, must be thrilled and invigorated by the statement that Agassiz is proud to enroll himself in their ranks. The good, grand, noble man, the apostle of pure science, the investigator and discoverer, the person who was preëminently a scientific force as well as a scientific intelligence dies with the feeling that his occupation was that of a ‘teacher.’ He, of course, leaves little or no property to his family; the noble woman, the bereaved wife, the constant companion of his intellect as well as of his heart, she who followed him whithersoever he was led by the spirit of scientific research, is, we suppose, the executrix of little but his glory; but the will is sublime, because it records the fact that Louis Agassiz was ‘a teacher.’ That was his occupation on earth. What it may be above, we do not pretend to know. One thing we know is this, that the simple preamble to his will must kindle into a generous flame every soul engaged in the great cause of education. ‘Louis Agassiz, teacher!’ but what a teacher! We preserve many memories of precious conversations with him on this question of teaching. He considered that teaching was a communication of life as well as of knowledge. A lad of ten years once contrived to get into the State House when Agassiz was urging the incontrovertible arguments for his ‘museum.’ We happened to jostle against the lad as he was leaving the hall, and asked him, laughingly, his opinion of the performance. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve been to many lectures, and have been tired to death, but Agassiz comes right up to my notion of the circus!’ When we told Agassiz of this queer compliment, he was much pleased. He wanted to see the boy who had been so unconsciously appreciative of the spirit of his speech. He knew that he had magnetized grave and elderly men, and that what he asked for would be cheerfully granted; but he desired to shake hands with the lad who thought he was as good as ‘a circus,’ and sent out from his deep lungs great roars of laughter in welcoming the testimony of his juvenile admirer.
“It would be idle to multiply instances of the thorough humanity and geniality of Agassiz. Everybody who knew him can tell hundreds of anecdotes illustrative of his sympathy with all forms of life, whether in the jelly-fish, the human infant, the developing boy or girl, the mature man or woman. Still his conviction of the immateriality and personality of mind was something wonderful in so austere a naturalist. We happened once to please him by defining a jelly-fish as organized water. ‘Now look at it through the microscope,’ he said. ‘But, Agassiz, the play of the organization is so wonderful that it seems to me that nothing but mind can account for it.’ ‘You are right,’ was his answer; ‘in some incomprehensible way, God Almighty has created these beings, and I cannot doubt of their immortality any more than I doubt of my own.’ His fealty to the rights of animals exceeded that of any great naturalist who ever preceded him. Incompetent as we are to give him his due rank among the great naturalists of the world, we think he excelled every naturalist who has gone before him in striking at the soul and individuality of all animals below man. It is impossible to convey in words the peculiar feeling which Agassiz had on this matter. Doubtless this large and genial genius is now satisfied. We cannot penetrate beyond the veil.
“What we can do, however, is to celebrate Agassiz as a teacher, and try to send a new glow into the heart of every person engaged in the difficult art of teaching. How hard is their work! The present generation is brought up, as far as education is concerned, on the most economical principles. No consideration whatever is given to the point of the will of Agassiz. When he proudly calls himself ‘a teacher,’ he means that he is a radiator of heat as well as of light. A poet has well described the method of instruction adopted by Agassiz:
“‘He was like the sun giving me life;
Pouring into the caves of my young brain
Knowledge from his bright fountains.’”
Pipe, Tobacco and Matches in his Coffin
Mr. Klaës, who was known among his acquaintances by the name of the “King of Smokers,” died some years ago near Rotterdam. According to the Belgian papers he had amassed a large fortune in the linen trade, and had erected near Rotterdam a mansion, one portion of which was devoted to the arrangement of a collection of pipes according to their nationality and chronological order. A few days before his death he summoned his lawyer, and made his will, in which he directed that all the smokers of the country should be invited to his funeral, that each should be presented with 10 lb. of tobacco and two Dutch pipes of the newest fashion, on which should be engraved the name, arms and date of the decease of the testator. He requested all his relatives, friends and funeral guests to be careful to keep their pipes alight during the funeral ceremonies, after which they should empty the ashes from their pipes on the coffin. The poor of the neighborhood who attended to his last wishes were to receive annually, on the anniversary of his death, 10 lb. of tobacco and a small cask of good beer. He desired that his oak coffin should be lined with the cedar of his old Havana cigar boxes, and that a box of French caporal and a packet of old Dutch tobacco should be placed at the foot of his coffin. His favorite pipe was to be placed by his side, along with a box of matches, a flint and steel, and some tinder, as he said there was no knowing what might happen. A clever calculator has made out that Mr. Klaës had, during his eighty years of life, smoked more than four tons of tobacco, and had drunk about 500,000 quarts of beer.
Thankfulness to God
In the codicil annexed to the last will of Robert North, Esq., of Scarborough, England, proved in October, 1705, the following occurs:
“I give to Mrs. R. G. my English walnut bureau, made large to contain clothes, but hope she will not forget when she makes use of it that graces and virtues are a lady’s most ornamental dress; and that that dress has this peculiar excellence, that it will last for ever and improve by wearing.
“I give to Lieutenant W. M., my godson, my sword, and hope he will (if ever occasion should require it) convince a rash world he has learnt to obey his God as well as his general, and that he entertains too true a sense of honour to admit anything into the character of a good soldier which is inconsistent with the duty of a good Christian.