POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



instruments. In the deep cellar of the observatory M. d'Abbadie 

 made more than two thousand seismic observations with the pen- 

 dulum. 



The chateau stands in an admirable situation, and presents a 

 very fine external aspect. We give a general view of it and a picture 

 of the main entrance. The interior decoration is very beautiful. 



Those who have had the privilege of visiting Abbadia have re- 

 marked that a stone is missing from the balcony of one of the win- 

 dows; this stone, according to 

 the wishes of the donor, is 

 never to be put in place. A 

 history is connected with its 

 absence. M. d'Abbadie, in 

 the course of a journey in 

 America, contracted a strong 

 friendship with Prince Louis 

 Napoleon, who was then in 

 the United States. The prince 

 once said to him, " If I ever 

 come into power, whatever 

 you may ask of me is granted 

 in advance." The prince be- 

 came Emperor of the French. 

 Napoleon III had a good 

 memory. He met his former 

 companion one day, and said 

 to him in an offhand way : " I 

 promised when we were in 

 America to give you what- 

 ever you would ask for; have you forgotten it?" M. d'Abbadie 

 replied : " I have built myself a chateau near Hendaye, where I hope 

 to spend the rest of my days. If you will be so kind as to go a few 

 kilometres out of the way for me during your coming visit to Biarritz, 

 I shall consider myself highly honored if you will lay the last stone 

 of my house." Napoleon smiled and promised. But that was in 

 1870, and Napoleon III never returned to Biarritz. That is the 

 reason a stone is missing at Abbadia. 



An account is also appropriate here of that other gift to French 

 science and letters of the Chateau of Chantilly, made to the Institute 

 of France in 1886, by the late Due d'Aumale, whose tragic death 

 in consequence of the terrible disaster at the Bazaar de Charite, Paris, 

 occurred near in time to that of M. d'Abbadie. The duke was con- 

 spicuous as a soldier, as a man of letters, the author of the History 

 of the Princes of Conde, and as a great bibliophile; as a member of 



Fig. 2. — Principal Entrance to the Chateau 

 d'Abbadie. 



