170 EULOGY ON AMPERE. 



several amusing little scenes enacted between himself and bis pupils ; 

 and one or two are so illustrative of amusing simplicity and a not-to-be- 

 superanunated good-nature, that I shall venture to try their effect sec- 

 ond-hand. On the very first day I went to hear him, (it was an introduc- 

 tory lecture,) lie had so filled the slate with first and secondary branches 

 of the goodly tree of science as to leave no room for more boughs, 

 unless by topping the head and abridging the undue growth of the origi- 

 nal shoots. Space was wanted, and the remedy should have been at 

 hand ; but, lo ! the sponge had disappeared, and could nowhere be 

 found, though the class showed much cmiyressement in seeking it. At 

 last, with a look most comically solemn, the old gentleman drew out his 

 cottdn representative for a foulard* and looking first at the slate and 

 then at the mouc]ioir,f plainly could not make up his mind to sullj" its 

 gaudy colors by exacting from it the ofiice of the sponge. But while 

 necessity and reluctance were contending for the mastery on his features, 

 the sponge was picked up by one of the students and eagerly presented 

 to M. Ampere, whose delight and manner of expressing it were irre- 

 sistibly comic. Seizing it between both his hands, as if to be sure that 

 it was not the shadow of the veritable detergent, but the very substance 

 that he held, he hastened to the door, and putting his head out, called 

 to his assistant, a la Molidre, in the happiest and most unconscious 

 imitation of the de Pourccangnac accent " Jc Vai trouve; c'cst a dire, 

 oil Va trouve — il n^entendpas. [Aside:] Monsieur ! Ecoutez done P'' Then 

 at the highest i^itch of his voice, '■'■Monsieur ! ne vous donnez pas la peine 

 de la vhercJter; je Vai ici; on v lent de la ramasser ! ''^ "I have found 

 it, that is to say, it is found. He doesn't hear me, (aside.) Monsieur ! 

 I say, Monsieur, don't trouble yourself about it; I have got it here; 

 they've just picked it up!" Then, quite regardless, and ajiparently un- 

 conscious, of what the French journalists call "ime vive explosion dliila- 

 rite'''X from the class, he resumed as if nothing had occiuTcd. He had 

 been lecturing on the polarization of light and heat, and had assumed 

 a. square ruler and a pasteboard almanac to represent a cylindrical ray 

 and a transparent medium of transmission, when gradually warming 

 with his subject, he began (as one is apt to do in lecturing) to describe 

 X)arabolas with his ruler, one of which encountered the tumbler, (which 

 is here d^usagc,)^ and broke the pieces of glass into his eau sucrec.\\ (With- 

 out eau sucree nobody could get on with a lecture at the College de 

 France or the Sorbonne, though law and physic lecture with unlubri- 

 cated fauces.) Out of this half-demolished glass, he was presently 

 preparing to drink, when half a dozen voices at once called out, '■'■Mon- 

 sieur Ampere, eh, Monsieur Ampere, f/u allez-vous done f aire V "Monsieur 

 Ampere, oh, Monsieur Ampere, what are you going to do?" But he, 

 nothing heedful of these exclamations, raised the tumbler to his lips, 

 and began to sip its now dangerous contents. In an instant one of the 



*A real Ibaudaua. § Customary. 



t Haudkercliief . |1 Sugar and water. 



t A loud burst of merriment. 



