LINNEAX SOCIEXr OF LONDON. 5 I 



fame had preceded him ; he rearranged the Botanical Section of 

 the Leicester Museum . . . and assisted the scientific and philo- 

 sophical societies of the town ... In the last few months Mr. 

 Preston suffered from a distressing complaint, which he hore with 

 great courage and patience. He was a man oi: strong and simple 

 Christian faith, a devoted brother, a fast friend, genuine as pure 

 gold, and siugularlv modest." 



The writer has "to thank J. F. Duthie, Esq., F.L.S., Edward 

 Meyrick, Esq., E.E.S., F. E. Thompson, Esq., and Miss Preston, 

 for tlieir invaluable lielp in drawing up the foregoing obituary. 



[B. D. J.] 



Bernard Renault was born at Autun on March 4th, 1830. 

 During the early part of his scientific career his attention was 

 devoted to Physics and Chemistry, to which he made some original 

 contributions. It was in these sciences that be took his degree at 

 Paris in 18G7, and he then filled an official post as chemist in the 

 Xormal School of Cluny. But his life's work was destined to take 

 a different course. The neighbourhood of his native place, Autun, 

 is peculiarly rich in silicified remains of plants, of Permo-Carbon- 

 iferous age, and Renault soon became iuterested in these specimens, 

 and began to investigate their structure. He at once found him- 

 self on the road to important discoveries. Starting with the 

 anatomy of fossil Ferns of the genera Amichoropteris, Zj/gopteris, 

 n,ndBotr)/02iteris,he was led to found the new family Botryopteride?e, 

 based not merely on vegetative characters, but on a detailed 

 knowledge of tlie fructification in two of the genera. 



Another early work of the highest value is his investigation of 

 the structure of the remarkable genus Sphenophyllum, i-epresenting 

 a group now wholly extinct, unless indeed, as some have lately 

 maintained, the Psilotaceae are to be included in the same division. 

 He further elucidated the structure of fossil members of the 

 Equisetales by his investigation of the anatomical and reproductive 

 characters of Annularia. 



The striking results which Renault was attaining in Fossil 

 Botany soon attracted the attention of Adolphe Brongiiiart, the 

 great master of that science, who summoned him to Pai'is, where 

 he obtained the post of Assistant Naturalist, at the Museum of 

 Natural History. This modest appointment he continued to hold 

 to the close of his life. Unfortunately, the efforts which were 

 made to create for him a position more worthy of his eminent 

 merits remained without result. 



The work in which Brongniart specially desired the co-operation 

 of his younger colleague \\ as the investigation of silicified seeds, a 

 subject which has proved of the utmost importance to morpho- 

 lof^ical Botany. Renault was always careful to compare fossil with 

 analogous recent structures ; and in the course of his work on the 

 seed, he re-discovered the pollen-chamber of Cycads, in ignorance 



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