24 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



and Gessler all the time, and finally held out to me a quarto volume 

 filled with figures, with the request to promote his election to the 

 Academy. I stared at him as a cow will stare at a new stable-door, 

 and then burst into loud laughter, which almost dumfounded the 

 young candidate. The idea that I should be able to do anything for 

 the promotion of his candidature seemed as ridiculous as he looked 

 upon it as a matter of course. But, when I told him that I deemed 

 my assistance utterly superfluous, and that I had heard all my friends 

 of the Brongniart party talk about his election as a foregone conclusion, 

 he almost embraced me for joy, and said that his visit to me was the 

 most agreeable he had paid for a long time. He urged me to visit him, 

 to see his wife and his little son, and so on. Thus he left me, flushed 

 with excitement, and, when I told a friend at the Jardin des Plantes 

 that the whole affair seemed utterly incomprehensible to me, he said : 

 " You are a novice in such things. Do you know what a candidate for 

 the Academy is ? The unhappiest man in the world. He has to hire a 

 carriage for a month ; he rides out early in the morning to pay visits, 

 and comes home late in the evening, fearfully tired. He has no time 

 for eating and sleeping ; for of nights he dreams of fresh essays, and 

 finally sinks half dead into his easy-chair. He visits everybody, even 

 the cousin of the dress-maker who sews for the aunt of the wife of an 

 academician ; and you are surprised that Leverrier should come to see 

 you ? After a while, when I am a candidate, I shall also pay you a visit, 

 although I see you every day at the Jardin des Plantes. Otherwise 

 you might take offense." 



Leverrier had, at that time, a very pleasant home. His wife was a 

 handsome, amiable woman, his son was a fat, rosy-cheeked boy, and 

 his daily visitor was Arago, who knew how to interest the smallest as 

 well as the largest circles by his lively and witty conversation. He was 

 a republican, like Arago, to whom he was indebted for everything, and 

 whom he afterward treated in a manner which was justly and harshly 

 criticised. For he became a rabid reactionist, and he whom everybody 

 had taken for a frank, noble character was soon looked upon as the 

 most rancorous man in Paris. People admired the astronomical calcu- 

 lator and the indefatigable student ; but they hated and even despised 

 the colleague and the superior. I am inclined to think that all the 

 members of the Academy together were not so cordially execrated 

 during their lifetime as Leverrier alone. I was averse to renew my 

 intimacy with the man who had become repugnant to me. 



I do not propose to analyze here the scientific merits of the men 

 whom France has recently lost. If Becquerel and Regnault were known 

 only in professional circles, the name of Leverrier is familiar to all who 

 have heard of the planet Neptune, which he so ingeniously discovered ; 

 and Claude Bernard is not unknown to cultivated people, as his fertile 

 pen has popularized physiological knowledge and investigations. Only 

 one of the four, Becquerel, was popular as a lecturer ; Claude Bernard 



