Part 13

III

1864-1866

The Harvard Medical School--With Louis Agassiz to the Amazon

IN 1864 the family moved from Newport to Boston, where Henry James, Senior, took a house on Ashburton Place (No. 13) for two years, and there was no more occasion for family letters. Although James began the regular course at the Medical School, he had arrived at no clear professional purpose and no selection of any particular field of study. The School afforded him some measure of preparation for natural science as well as for practice.

Philosophy had undoubtedly begun to beckon him, although its appealing gesture lacked authority and did not enlist him in any regular course of philosophic studies. In sixty-five he wrote to his brother Henry from Brazil saying, "When I get home, I'm going to study philosophy all my days." But in many respects his character and tastes matured slowly. The instruction offered by Professor Francis Bowen in Harvard College does not appear to have excited his interest at all. It cannot have failed to excite the irony of his father,--as did everything of the sort that was academic and orthodox,--and James would have been aware of this and might have been influenced. On the other hand, it was obvious that, in the case of his father, who had no connection with church, college or school, the consideration and expression of theories and beliefs had always been a totally unremunerative occupation; and James had to consider how to earn a living. His prospective share of the property that had sufficed for his parents was clearly not going to be enough to support him in independent leisure. In the way of bread and butter, biology and medicine offered more than metaphysical speculation. Last and most important, the tide of contemporary inquiry, driven forward by the storm of the Darwinian controversy, was setting strongly toward a fresh examination of nature. Philosophy must embrace the new reality. Everything that was stimulating in contemporary thought urged men to the scrutiny of the phenomenal world. "Natural History," which has since diversified and amplified itself beyond the use of that appellation, was almost romantically "having its day."

Grau, teurer Freund, ist alle Theorie, Und grün des Lebens goldener Baum.

Thus Goethe, and Louis Agassiz, whose lectures James had already followed, and with the abundance of whose inspiring activity no other scientific energizing could then compare, was fond of quoting the lines.

Under such circumstances it was not strange that James should interrupt his medical studies in order to join the expedition which Agassiz was preparing to lead to the Amazon.

No richer or more instructive experience could well have offered itself to him at twenty-three than this journey to Brazil seemed to promise. He was no sooner on the Amazon, however, than it became clear to him that he was not intended to be a field-naturalist; and he pictured the stages of this self-discovery in long, diary-like letters which he sent home to his family. On arriving at Rio he was forced to consider the question of his going on or coming home, by an illness that kept him quarantined for several uncomfortable weeks, and left him depressed and unable to use his eyes during several weeks more. Although he decided in favor of continuing with Agassiz, he revealed more and more clearly in his letters that he was seeing Brazil with the eye of an adventurer and lover of landscape rather than of a geologist or collector, and that the months spent in fishing and pickling specimens were to count most for him by teaching him what his vocation was not. He found that he was essentially indifferent to the classification of birds, beasts, and fishes, and that he was not made to deal with the riddle of the universe from the only angle of approach that was possible in Agassiz's company.

It would be a mistake, however, to let it appear that nine months of collecting with Louis Agassiz were nine months wasted. There are some men whom it is an education to work under, even though the affair in hand be foreign to one's ultimate concern. Agassiz was such an one, "recognized by all as one of those naturalists in the unlimited sense, one of those folio-copies of mankind, like Linnæus and Cuvier." Thirty years after, James could still say of him: "Since Benjamin Franklin we had never had among us a person of more popularly impressive type.... He was so commanding a presence, so curious and enquiring, so responsive and expansive, and so generous and reckless of himself and his own, that everyone said immediately, Here is no musty savant, but a man, a great man, a man on the heroic scale, not to serve whom is avarice and sin."--"To see facts and not to argue or raisonniren was what life meant for Agassiz," and James, who was already incorrigibly interested in the causes, values and purposes of things, and whose education had been most unsystematic, profited by his corrective influence. "James," said Agassiz at this time, "some people perhaps consider you a bright young man; but when you are fifty years old, if they ever speak of you then, what they will say will be this: That James--oh, yes, I know him; he used to be a very bright young man!" Such "cold-water therapeutics" were gratefully accepted from one who was not only a teacher but a kind friend; and James remembered them, and recorded later that "the hours he spent with Agassiz so taught him the difference between all possible abstractionists and all livers in the light of the world's concrete fullness, that he was never able to forget it." Considering with what passionate fidelity his own abstractions always face the concrete, this is perhaps more of an acknowledgment than at first sight appears.

* * * * *

The Thayer Expedition set sail from New York April 1, 1865. The next letter was written from ship-board, still in New York Harbor. The "Professor" will be recognized as Louis Agassiz.

To his Mother.

...We have been detained 48 hours on this steamer in port on account of different accidents.... A dense fog is raging which will prevent our going outside as long as it lasts. Sapristi! c'est embêtant....

The Professor has just been expatiating over the map of South America and making projects as if he had Sherman's army at his disposal instead of the ten novices he really has. He may get some students at Rio to accompany the different parties, which will let them be more numerous. I'm sure I hope he will, on account of the language. If each of us has a Portuguese companion, he can do things twice as easily. The Prof. now sits opposite me with his face all aglow, holding forth to the Captain's wife about the imperfect education of the American people. He has talked uninterruptedly for a quarter of an hour at least. I know not how she reacts; I presume she feels somewhat flattered by the attention, however. This morning he made a characteristic speech to Mr. Billings, Mr. Watson's friend. Mr. B. had offered to lend him some books. Agassiz: "May I enter your state-room and take them when I shall want them, sir?" Billings, extending his arm said genially, "Sir, all that I have is yours!" To which, Agassiz, far from being overcome, replied, shaking a monitory finger at the foolishly generous wight, "Look out, sir, dat I take not your skin!" That expresses very well the man. Offering your services to Agassiz is as absurd as it would be for a South Carolinian to invite General Sherman's soldiers to partake of some refreshment when they called at his house....

At this moment Prof. passes behind me and says, "Now today I am going to show you a little what I will have you do." Hurray! I have not been able to get a word out of the old animal yet about my fate. I'm only sorry I can't tell you....

To his Parents.

RIO, BRAZIL, Apr. 21, 1865.

MY DEAREST PARENTS,--Every one is writing home to catch the steamer which leaves Rio on Monday. I do likewise, although, so far, I have very little to say to you. You cannot conceive how pleasant it is to feel that tomorrow we shall lie in smooth water at Rio and the horrors of this voyage will be over. O the vile Sea! the damned Deep! No one has a right to write about the "nature of Evil," or to have any opinion about evil, who has not been at sea. The awful slough of despond into which you are there plunged furnishes too profound an experience not to be a fruitful one. I cannot yet say what the fruit is in my case, but I am sure some day of an accession of wisdom from it. My sickness did not take an actively nauseous form after the first night and second morning; but for twelve mortal days I was, body and soul, in a more indescribably hopeless, homeless and friendless state than I ever want to be in again. We had a head wind and tolerably rough sea all that time. The trade winds, which I thought were gentle zephyrs, are hideous moist gales that whiten all the waves with foam....

Sunday Evening. Yesterday morning at ten o'clock we came to anchor in this harbor, sailing right up without a pilot. No words of mine, or of any man short of William the divine, can give any idea of the magnificence of this harbor and its approaches. The boldest, grandest mountains, far and near. The palms and other trees of such vivid green as I never saw anywhere else. The town "realizes" my idea of an African town in its architecture and effect. Almost everyone is a negro or a negress, which words I perceive we don't know the meaning of with us; a great many of them are native Africans and tattooed. The men have white linen drawers and short shirts of the same kind over them; the women wear huge turbans, and have a peculiar rolling gait that I have never seen any approach to elsewhere. Their attitudes as they sleep and lie about the streets are picturesque to the last degree.

Yesterday was, I think, the day of my life on which I had the most outward enjoyment. Nine of us took a boat at about noon and went on shore. The strange sights, the pleasure of walking on terra firma, the delicious smell of land, compared with the hell of the last three weeks, were perfectly intoxicating. Our Portuguese went beautifully,--every visage relaxed at the sight of us and grinned from ear to ear. The amount of fraternal love that was expressed by bowing and gesture was tremendous. We had the best dinner I ever eat. Guess how much it cost. 140,000 reis--literal fact. Paid for by the rich man of the party. The Brazilians are of a pale Indian color, without a particle of red and with a very aged expression. They are very polite and obliging. All wear black beaver hats and glossy black frock coats, which makes them look like des épiciers endimanchés. We all returned in good order to the ship at 11 P.M., and I lay awake most of the night on deck listening to the soft notes of the vampire outside of the awning. (Not knowing what it was, we'll call it the vampire.) This morning Tom Ward and I took another cruise on shore, which was equally new and strange. The weather is like Newport. I have not seen the thermometer....

Agassiz just in, delighted with the Emperor's simplicity and the precision of his information; but apparently they did not touch upon our material prospects. He goes to see the Emperor again tomorrow. Agassiz is one of the most fascinating men personally that I ever saw. I could listen to him talk by the hour. He is so childlike. Bishop Potter, who is sitting opposite me writing, asks me to give his best regards to father. I am in such a state of abdominal tumefaction from having eaten bananas all day that I can hardly sit down to write. The bananas here are no whit better than at home, but so cheap and so filling at the price. My fellow "savans" are a very uninteresting crew. Except Tom Ward I don't care if I never see one of 'em again. I like Dr. Cotting very much and Mrs. Agassiz too. I could babble on all night, but must stop somewhere.

Dear old Father, Mother, Aunt Kate, Harry and Alice! You little know what thoughts I have had of you since I have been gone. And I have felt more sympathy with Bob and Wilk than ever, from the fact of my isolated circumstances being more like theirs than the life I have led hitherto. Please send them this letter. It is written as much for them as for anyone. I hope Harry is rising like a phoenix from his ashes, under the new régime. Bless him. I wish he or some person I could talk to were along. Thank Aunt Kate once more. Kiss Alice to death. I think Father is the wisest of all men whom I know. Give my love to the girls, especially the Hoopers. Tell Harry to remember me to T. S. P and to Holmes. Adieu.

Your loving W. J.

Give my love to Washburn.

To his Father.

RIO, June 3, 1865.

MY DEAREST OLD FATHER AND MY DEAREST OLD EVERYBODY AT HOME,--I've got so much to say that I don't well know where to begin.--I sent a letter home, I think about a fortnight ago, telling you about my small-pox, etc., but as it went by a sailing vessel it is quite likely that this may reach you first. That was written from the maison de santé where I was lying in the embrace of the loathsome goddess, and from whose hard straw bed, eternal chicken and rice, and extortionate prices I was released yesterday. The disease is over, and granting the necessity of having it, I have reason to think myself most lucky. My face will not be marked at all, although at present it presents the appearance of an immense ripe raspberry.... My sickness began four weeks ago today. You have no idea of the state of bliss into which I have been plunged in the last twenty-four hours by the first draughts of my newly gained freedom. To be dressed, to walk about, to see my friends and the public, to go into the dining-room and order my own dinner, to feel myself growing strong and smooth-skinned again, make a very considerable reaction. Now that I know I am no longer an object of infection, I am perfectly cynical as to my appearance and go into the dining-room here when it is at its fullest, having been invited and authorized thereto by the good people of the hotel. I shall stay here for a week before returning to my quarters, although it is very expensive. But I need a soft bed instead of a hammock, and an arm-chair instead of a trunk to sit upon for some days yet....