t,ll Biographical Memoirs of P, Bay en, 



lines, madrepores, 8cc. Girod Chan tram has carefully ex- 

 amined fome of thefe fubftances, which had hitherto been 

 claffed among the cryptogamia kind of plants : hich as the 

 by(fus, conferva, ulva, tremella, &c; and obferved, that 

 the greater part of them are compofed of tubes or veffels, in 

 which beings that appear to be animated circulate. He 

 even diftinguiihcd in one fpecies of conferva a real volvox, . 

 which had fome fimilarity to the rotator of Gmelin. 



Thefe fuppofed plants, by a chemical analyfis, give the 

 fame refults as animal fubftances. He therefore concludes 

 that they are not plants, but fpecies of poly piers, formed, like 

 coral, by fmall animals. Of thefe polypicrs he diftinguifhes 

 two kinds; fome without tubes, and fome which have tubes. 

 We fhall then have three orders ot poly piers : — I ft, The 

 calcareous, fuch as corals and madrepores; the fubftance of 

 which is hard and calcareous: — 2d, Corallines, the fubftance 

 of which is foft and flexible, like fponge : — 3d, The conferva, 

 the fubftance of which is abfolutely herbaceous. It is to be 

 wifhed that naturalifts would pay attention to the ftudy of 

 the infects which conftruc~l thefe different kinds of polypiers, 

 as they are ftill unknown. 



[To be cont'mued J\ 



XVIII. Biographical Memoirs of Peter Bayen. ByM. LASSUS, 

 Secretary to the Clafs of the Pbyjical Sciences in the French 

 Nat. Injiitute. From the Annales de Chimie, Vol. XXVI. 



ETER BAYEN, member of the National Inftitute in the 

 feclion of chemiftry, was born at Chalons in the department 

 of la Marnc, in the year 1725. His parents, obferving that 

 he had a happy difpofition for learning, took the earlieft op- 

 portunity to improve it, by fending him to the college of 

 Troycs, where he ftudied the Latin language with the beft 

 fuccefs. Having terminated the courfe of his ftudies at 

 that place, he turned his attention to natural philofophy, 

 and, after acquiring the firft principles of chemiftry, foon 



became 



