Agassiz handled all specimens with the greatest care, and naturally had little patience with clumsiness; the following incident illustrates both his kindly spirit and his self-restraint. At one of the lectures he had handed down for inspection a very rare and costly fossil, from the coal-measures, I think; including the matrix, it had about the size and shape of the palm of the hand. He cautioned us not to drop it. When it had reached about the middle of the audience a crash was heard. The precious thing had been dropped by a new and somewhat uncouth assistant whom we will call Dr. X. He hastily gathered up the pieces and rushed out of the room. For a few seconds Agassiz stood as if himself petrified; then, without even an 'Excuse me,' he vanished by the same door. Presently he returned, flushed, gazing ruefully at the fragments in his hand, covered with mucilage or liquid glue. After a pause, during which those who knew him not awaited an explosive denunciation of gaucherie, Agassiz said quietly: 'In Natural History it is not enough to know how to study specimens; it is also necessary to know how to handle them'--and then proceeded with his lecture. His helpful attitude toward prospective teachers was exhibited in the following incidents. After my appointment to Cornell University in October, 1867, he arranged for me to give a course of six 'University Lectures,' and warned me to prepare for them carefully, because he should give me a 'raking down.' He attended them all (at what interruption of his own work I realize better now), and discussed them and my methods very frankly with me. Omitting the commendations, the following comments may be useful to other professorial tyros: 1. The main question or thesis should be stated clearly and concisely at the outset, without compelling the hearer to perform all the mental operations that have led the speaker to his own standpoint. 2. In dealing with the history of a subject, the value of each successive contribution should be estimated in the light of the knowledge at the period, not of that at the present time. VII HOW AGASSIZ TAUGHT PROFESSOR SCUDDER [Footnote: 'In the Laboratory with Agassiz,' by Samuel H. Scudder, from _Every Saturday_ (April 4, 1874) 16, 369-370.] It was more than fifteen years ago [from 1874] that I entered the laboratory of Professor Agassiz, and told him I had enrolled my name in the Scientific School as a student of natural history. He asked me a few questions about my object in coming, my antecedents generally, the mode in which I afterwards proposed to use the knowledge I might acquire, and, finally, whether I wished to study any special branch. To the latter I replied that, while I wished to be well grounded in all departments of zoology, I purposed to devote myself specially to insects. 'When do you wish to begin?' he asked. 'Now,' I replied.