126 EULOGY ON AMPERE. 



and the higlier kinds of poetry. Take for example a letter handed to 

 me recently, by oiu? learned colleague M. Isidore Geoffroy, from Bourg, 

 and read by bim, the 26th germinal, year XI, before the Emulation 

 Society of Ain, begiunin'g thus : 



Vous voulez, (lone, belle Emilia, 

 Que de Gresset oii d'Hamiltou 

 D6robant le leger crayon, 

 • J'aille chorcher dans ma folia, 



Sur les rosiers de I'Hdlicon, 

 S'il reste encor quelque bouton 

 De tant de ileurs qu'ils out cueillies ; 

 Souvcut mes tendi'es reveries, etc. 



Then, wouldst thou, fairest Emily, 



Have me steal the pencil free 

 Of Gresset or of Hamilton ; 



And wend my way to Helicon, 

 To see if on the rose trees there 

 Some buds remain, they well could spare 



From all the flowers they have culled 

 To glean some Ijud they well could spare 



To be for thy soft bosom pulled. 



I am not siu'e that the beautifid Emily was not one of those imagi- 

 nary beings so lavishlj' invested by poets with perfections of their own 

 creation; but the friends of Ampere will remember that the eminently 

 good, beautiful and distinguished woman, who h^d uuited her destiny 

 with his, had often inspired his muse; many will recall some lines, 

 whose first appearance excited no little sensation ; 



Que j'ainie a m'c^-garer dans ces routes fleuries, 

 Oil je t 'ai vue errcr sous un dais de lilas; 

 Que j'aime a r^petor aux uymphes attendries, 

 Sur I'herbe oii tu t'assis, les vers que tu chantas. 



Les voila ces jasmins dont je t'avais par^e, 



Ce bouquet de troiine a touch6 tes cheveux, etc. 



'Tis sweet my wandering steps to lose 



Along the path of flowers. 

 Where lighter feet were wont to choose. 



Their way mid lilac bowers : 

 And on the turf that thou hast prest, 



To breathe forth once again, 

 The song that made the wood nymphs blest, 



Thine own enchanting strain. 



They lie around, those jasmins fair 



With which I declc'd thy brow ; 

 That privet, it hath touched thy hair, 



To me 'tis sacred now. 



A certain mathematician once made the sad mistake of publishing 

 some verses, faultless as to measure and rhyme, but without other 

 merit. A witty lady, hearing them read, remarked that the author 

 of the lines, after the example of M. Jourdain, ivrote prose icitkont 

 Tcnoicing it. Many writers, called poets, though never having passed 

 through a course of geometry, have fallen into the same error. A 

 satirical remark, however, cannot revive the so often silenced question 

 of the chilling influences of scientific studies. Such names as those of 



