246 Biographical Account of [April 



the close of his career, and when the expedition to Algiers 

 attracted attention to that country, that he yielded to the 

 request of Walkenaer to admit of the publication of his 

 manuscripts. 



These fragments appeared in 1830, in the Nouvelles An- 

 nates des Voyages (vol. xvi, xvii.) but their author took no 

 part in the publication, and often regretted that a publication 

 of his should have been presented to the public, written in 

 such a careless style and so disfigured with typographical 

 errors. 



Desfontaines being thus prevented from writing a his- 

 torical account of his travels, devoted his time entirely to 

 botany ; bestowing much pains on the nomenclature of the 

 plants of the garden and on his botanical course. In the 

 latter, he developed the principles of vegetable physiology. 



His manner was simple and clear, without any pretension, 

 and till the last his. lectures were flocked to. Extracts from 

 these have been published in the first volume of the Decade 

 Philosophique, and re-printed in the Annates oV Usteri. At 

 this period of his life, being occupied with the study of the 

 plants of Barbary, he -presented to the Academy several 

 descriptive memoirs which were published either in his 

 Memoirs, in the Journal of Fourcroy, or in the Actes de la 

 Societe oV histoire Naturelle. 



During the bloody period of the revolution, Desfontaines 

 remained shut up in the Jardin des plantes, engaged with 

 the description of his herbarium, visiting such men of science 

 as were cruelly put in prison, and encouraging those who 

 required it. At his eminent peril he visited M. Ramond 

 while in confinement. M. Lheritier being basely imprisoned 

 and threatened with death, Desfontaines with his friend 

 Thonin exerted himself to procure his pardon. They ob- 

 tained a suspension of the sentence under the pretext that 

 Lheritier was about to publish the collections of M. Dom- 

 bey, and thus saved his life. Such conduct at that eventful 

 period, must be characterized as a proof of the strongest 

 friendship and of great courage, and is the more praise- 

 worthy when the natural timidity of Desfontaines is taken 

 into consideration ; a timidity, however, which arose from 

 an excess of modesty and distrust in himself. 



On the accession of the calm which succeeded the storms 



