Biographical Sfitich of Professor Volta, 5 



history of science, that distinguished body presented him with 

 a gold medal with this inscription, A Volta, la Classe des 

 Scierices Mathematiques et Physiques, In the following year 

 the Institute sent him another, with the inscription, A Volta, 

 associe etranger; and most of the academies of Europe were 

 proud to enrol his name in the list of their members. 



From Paris Volta repaired to Lyons to assist, in the cha- 

 racter of deputy from the university of Pavia, at the meeting 

 which was convoked in that city to elect a President of the 

 Italian Republic. When the election was over he was seized 

 with a serious illness, which obliged him to remain some months 

 at Lyons, and afterwards at Geneva, where he experienced the 

 most hospitable reception from the learned professors of that 

 city, with whom he had long been on habits of the most inti- 

 mate friendship. 



The honours which our author thus received in foreign 

 countries were followed by others conferred upon him at home. 

 He was raised to the rank of a count, and thus became a se- 

 nator of the kingdom of Italy. In this capacity he was ob- 

 liged to spend part of the year at Milan, and he repaired every 

 evening to the parties of Paradisi, President of the Academy, 

 at whose house were assembled the most distinguished indivi- 

 duals of the country. 



In the year 1804 he had obtained leave to retire from his 

 professorship, on the condition of his giving a few lectures 

 every year. On this occasion Napoleon said to him, " Great 

 men die on the field of honour."" Volta never forgot this say- 

 ing, and after the fall of Buonaparte he said, in allusion to it, 

 " He, however, has not kept his word with me." 



Living in a frontier town, Volta was one of the first Ita- 

 lians who presented himself to Buonaparte when he entered 

 Italy for the first time. His fellow-citizens sent him in 1796, 

 along with Count T. B. Giovio, to request the protection of 

 the conqueror. From that time Buonaparte never lost an op- 

 portunity of honouring Volta. He conferred upon him the 

 orders of the Legion of Honour, and of the Iron Crown, and 

 the titles of Count and Senator of the kingdom of Italy ; and 

 at the formation of the national Institute of SciQpce and Let- 

 ters, when they were deliberating in his presence whether 



