OF ARTS AND SCIENCES : JUNE 9, 1868. 47 



with the works and original papers of the physiologists of the present 

 century made him an acknowledged authority on physiological ques- 

 tions. Honest and frank in the expression of his views, when he had 

 occasion to present them, he possessed the rare virtue of being able 

 and willing to recognize and acknowledge an erroneous opinion of his 

 own, whenever the error could be demonstrated. When we consider the 

 extent and variety of his labors, — his private practice, his hospital at- 

 tendance, his collegiate teaching, and his published writings, — we are 

 surprised that one man could have found time to accomplish so much 

 and so well. 



M. Rayer died in Paris, September 10, 1867, at the age of seventy- 

 four years and six months. The appreciation in which his services to 

 science and medicine were held by his contemporaries was abundantly 

 evinced by the numerous eulogies that were pronounced at the time of 

 his death. 



Franz Bopp, Professor of Sanskrit and of Comparative Philology 

 in the University at Berlin, died on the 23d of October last, at the 

 advanced age of seventy-six years. Among the philologists of the 

 present century he was perhaps the foremost. Others of his contem- 

 poraries, especially of his countrymen, have shown not less remarkable 

 talent, reached as high a degree of scholarship, and won an equal dis- 

 tinction, in various departments of the study of languages and litera- 

 tures ; but to him belongs the peculiar and transcendent honor of hav- 

 ing inaugurated and given development to a new science, — that of the 

 historical investigation of human speech. It is an honor of which he 

 can be in no measure deprived ; even though it be shown that some of 

 his discoveries had been partially anticipated by others, or, on the 

 other hand, that the times were ripe for the appearance of such a 

 science, which must have sprung up and gained a rapid growth with- 

 out him. For, as a matter of fact, it was he who turned to profitable 

 account the scattered and imperfect perceptions of others, who im- 

 proved and made fruitful their methods of research, who took advan- 

 tage of the favorable conditions of the times, and with steady devotion, 

 clear insight, and admirable skill, laid a foundation and reared a sti'uc- 

 ture which others may indeed improve and extend, but can never destroy. 



Bopp was born at Mayence, in Bavaria, on the 14th of September, 

 1791, and received his early education at Aschatfenburg, where the 

 influence especially of Windischmann directed his attention to Orien- 

 tal studies. At the age of twenty-one he went to Paris, drawn thither 



