LIKUEAN SOCIETY OF LOIfDON. 3 1 



for fhe Advancement of Science in 1854. He was elected a 

 Foreign Member of the G-eoL)gieal Society of London in 1851, 

 and in 1872 received the WoUaston Medal, la 1877 the Ko\ al 

 Society awarded him the Copley Medal, and in 1881 elected him 

 a Foreign Member. 



He was the recipient of honorary degrees of Munich and 

 Harvard : and was Honorary Member of the Academies of Paris, 

 Berlin, Vienna, St. Petersburg, and Eome, and of the Mineralo- 

 gieal Societies of England and France. 



He was elected a Foreign Member of this Society in 1854. 

 He died suddenly from heart failure on April 15th, 1895. 



PiEREE Etienne Simon Duchartre was born at Portiragnes, a 

 small village near Beziers, on October 27th, 1811, the second of 

 nine children, his father being an advocate at Bezier.s, and 

 descended on both sides from country proprietors. About the 

 age of 12 his family removed to Toulouse, where the subject of 

 our notice completed his early training. Having finished his 

 classical course while only fifteen years of age, he was compelled 

 to wait till he was older to proceed to his Bachelor's degree ; 

 and while waiting for this efflux of time, he attended certain 

 scientific courses, and thus acquired a taste for botany. He 

 gained several prizes in this department, much to the regret of 

 his father, who wanted his son to follow in his own steps. In 

 obedience to parental desire, our future Foreign Member applied 

 himself for one year to the study of the Law ; but his repugnance 

 to this could not be overcome, and his father allowed his son's 

 strong bent to have its way. 



Thus it became necessary for him to seek some way of earning 

 his daily bread, the means of taking his degree, aud also to help 

 his family at that time, reduced in number to two. He gave 

 lessons on botanical subjects at first in Toulouse, then from the 

 year 1837 at Monsempron ; the year before this, 1836, he issued 

 a fasciculus of dried plants of the neighbourhood of Toulouse, 

 named " Flore pyreneen," as well as a memoir ot the local plants, 

 which was presented to the Academy of Paris only in 1844. At 

 Monsempron he found himself quite alone, and destitute of his 

 accustomed books to help him in his work. He thereupon began 

 his studies in the history aud development of the flower; and 

 during the six years he lived at that place he prepared his thesis 

 for the degree of Doctor. In 1843 Duchartre arrived in Paris, 

 where an elder brother was living ; his ambition was to so succeed 

 there as to be able to return to Lis home in the south as professor 

 in the faculty of science. His purse being slenderly filled, he 

 presented huuself to Brongniart and to Decaisne : both received 

 him amiably, but at first were not able to give him the employ- 

 ment wanted. He then accepted a position on tbe Stafl^ of the 

 ' Echo du Monde savaute ' by offering to make translations from 

 Euglish, German, &c., in a short time becoming the Editor of 

 this print. The following year Decaisae presented Duchartre to 



