4 LAMARCK, HIS LIFE AND WORK 
composed of a few more houses than its sister ham- 
let, is seen half a mile to the southeast, shaded by the 
little forest such as borders nearly every town and 
village in this region. The two hamlets are pleas- 
antly situated in a richly cultivated country, on the 
chalk uplands or downs of Picardy, amid broad acres 
of wheat and barley variegated with poppies and the 
purple cornflower, and with roadsides shaded by tall 
poplars. 
The peasants to the number of 251 compose the 
diminishing population. There were 356 in 1880, or 
about that date. The silence of the single little 
street, with its one-storied, thatched or tiled cottages, 
isat infrequent intervals broken by an elderly dame in 
her sadots, or by a creaking, rickety village cart driven 
by a farmer-boy in blouse and hob-nailed shoes. The 
largest inhabited building is the mazrze, a modern 
structure, at one end of which is the village school, 
where fifteen or twenty urchins enjoy the instruc- 
tions of the worthy teacher. A stone church, built 
in 1774, and somewhat larger than the needs of the 
hamlet at present require, raises its tower over the 
quiet scene. 
Our pilgrimage to Bazentin had for its object the 
discovery of the birthplace of Lamarck, of which we 
could obtain no information in Paris. Our guide 
from Albert took us to the mazrze, and it was with 
no little satisfaction that we learned from the excel- 
lent village teacher, M. Duval, that the house in 
which the great naturalist was born was still stand- 
ing, and but a few steps away, in the rear of the 
church and of the mazrze. With much kindness he 
