106 Lagrange’s Memoirs. 
him. About the end of March fever showed itself, appetite departed, 
sleep troubled him, his mouth was parched and he underwent alarm- 
ing swoons, especially when he awoke in the morning. He felt his 
danger; but keeping his imperturbable serenity, he studied what was 
going on within him; and, as if he had only to aid in a grand and 
rare experiment, he gave to it all his attention. His remarks have 
not been lost. Friendship brought to him, the 8th April, in the 
morning, MM. Lacépéde and Monge, and M. Chaptal, who con- 
sidered it a religious duty to collect the principal traits of a conver- 
sation that was his last. We have followed scrupulously all the in- 
dications it contains, and the passages that we have italicized in 
another quotation, are faithfully copied from sie manuscript of M. 
le Comte Chaptal. 
He received them with tenderness and cordiality. Pai eté bien 
mal avant hier, mes amis, said he to them, je me sentats mourir ; 
mon corps s’affaiblissait peu-d-peu, mes facultés morales et physi- 
ques s’étetgnaient insensiblement ; j’observais avec plaisir la pro- 
gression bien graduée de la diminution de mes forces, et j’arrivats 
au terme sans douleur, sans regrets, et par une pente bien douce. 
Oh! la mort n'est pas a redouter, et lorsqu’ elle vient sans douleur, 
eest une derniere fonction gui n'est ni penible ni désagréable. 
Then he explained to them his ideas about life, of which he believed 
the seat was every where, in all the organs, in the whole mass of 
the machine, which in his case decayed equally throughout, and by 
the same degrees. Quelques instans de plus, il n’y avait plus de 
fonctions nulle part, la mort était par-tout ; la mort n’est que le re- 
em: absolu du corps. 
Je voulais mourir, added he with more strength, ~— je voulais 
mourir, et jy trouvais du plaisir ; mais ma femme na pas vouler : 
j eusse prefe ré en ces momens une Seton moins bonne, moins em- 
ae a reanimer mes Sorts; et qui m’eiit laissé finir dowcement. 
ai fournt ma carriére ; = ai acquis eqe célébrité dans les 
vacate Je wai hai personne, je nai point fait de mal, et 
al faut bien finir: mais ma femme wa pas vouler. 
As he was very animated, especially at these last words, his 
friends, notwithstanding all the interest they took in hearing him, 
wished to withdraw. He began to give them the history of his life, 
of his labors, of his success, of his sojourn at Berlin, (where many 
times he has told us that he had seen close at hand un roi,) of his 
arrival at Paris, of the tranquillity which he had at rene enjoyed, of 
