THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE 13 



added a menagerie to the garden, a building for the Library and other 

 uses, and completed the amphitheater. In the hall of design provi- 

 sion was made Tor the study of animals and flowers. Although open 

 to both sexes, the lectures, in botany especially, were more popular with 

 young women than with young men. The menagerie, formed by Louis 

 XIV. and installed in the park at Versailles, amounted to little in the 

 time of Louis XV., and in 1795, when given over to St. Pierre, it was 

 an insignificant affair. Under skilful and intelligent management it 

 grew rapidly. At present it contains more than 1,200 different animals, 

 whose food alone is a very large item of expense. Milne-Edwards was 

 for many years at the head of this menagerie and by his management 

 added very much to its usefulness and its fame. Pie was succeeded by 

 his equally famous son. The museum is a place for study as well as 

 for the casual examination of attractive specimens. There are two 

 semesters each year, and the courses are so arranged as to parallel those 

 of the College of Prance and the Sorbonne. The same professors do 

 not teach in successive semesters. Each one of them devotes a portion 

 of the year to research. A special advantage in the instruction given 

 here is that pupils are shown the objects described, and are taught to 

 observe and describe for themselves. 



There is a course in which the characteristics of annelids, molluscs 

 and zoophytes are described, another in which attention is directed to 

 the organization, habits, changes and classification of insects, spiders, 

 Crustacea, another in which the organization of animals, the physiology 

 and classification of fishes are studied and in which conferences are 

 given on reptiles. In fact, provision is made for instruction in almost 

 every branch of natural history. In the galleries of the museum the 

 rarest specimens are found. 



Perhaps the schools of botany are the most important connected 

 with the museum. These were organized by Brogniart, though it is 

 true that the botanical school is older even than the Jardin des Plantes. 

 Women in good King Henry's time had a love for flowers and studied 

 them as well as they could. Jean Robin, a gardener of repute, dealt 

 in choice flowers. He brought some precious seeds and roots from Hol- 

 land which he refused to sell at any price. Guy Patin failed to obtain 

 them even by stratao-em. But la Brosse succeeded where others could 

 not, for he employed Robin's son as a demonstrator in the garden, and 

 thus persuaded the father to part with some of his precious possessions. 

 There are two courses in botany, both under the care of able and 

 eminent men. The garden is so arranged that it is easy even for a 

 visitor to learn the names and species of the plants and flowers which 

 it contains. Instruction is given in paleontology with special refer- 

 ence to the fossils of later geological epochs. There is a course in 

 vegetable physiology as applied to agriculture, one in general phys- 



