12 Baron Cuvier's Historical Ullage of Baron Ramond. 



mond was still heard in favour of order and the laws, but, as 

 on other occasions, it was raised in vain. Exhausted by anxiety, 

 and thrown into despair by the fruitlessness of his efforts, he 

 was taken ill, underwent a painful operation, and was reduced 

 to so alarming a state that his physicians made him set out for 

 Bareges some days before the 18th of August. He thus escaped 

 from the first danger ; but the vengeance of the triumphant 

 faction was not slow in pursuing him. He saw this himself, and 

 took refuge in the remotest recesses of the mountains, sustain- 

 ing himself on the milk and black bread of the shepherds. Ar- 

 rested at last on the 15th January 1794, and thrown into the 

 prison at Tarbes, it was owing to the ingenious humanity of 

 a soldier who knew his reputation, that he was not immediate- 

 ly dragged before the revolutionary tribunal. 



M. Lomet, a distinguished officer of engineers, who was 

 charged with the establishment of the hospitals of the army of 

 the Pyrenees, pretended that he required for this purpose to 

 consult a person well acquainted with the country. He M^as 

 thus permitted to confer with M. Ramond in his prison, and 

 to carry to him some relief. Lomet even solicited his libera- 

 tion from Carnot, but he judiciously replied to him, he is too 

 fortunate in being forgotten. There was also a stratagem 

 used in his favour by M. Monestier, an envoy from the conven- 

 tion, who had been charged with bringing to Paris those whom 

 the triumvirs had proscribed. He found some pretexts for de- 

 laying his departure, and this gained for him the 9th Ther- 

 midor. His life was then safe, but still he was not liberated. 

 He was not discharged from prison till the 9th November, and 

 he came out of it deprived of everything. In his prison he 

 had already been in a great measure supported by the labours 

 of a sister, who, with admirable courage, hastened to his relief, 

 and devoted herself to his fate. When once free, he resumed, 

 either from necessity or taste, that kind of life which previous 

 to his arrest he had led for his safety, and this precarious con- 

 dition did not terminate till 1796, when he obtained the situa- 

 tion of professor of natural history in the central school for 

 the upper Pyrenees, which was established at Tarbes. 



M. Ramond filled this situation for four years, — the hap- 

 piest perhaps of his life. The youth whom misfortune had 



