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