LAMARTINE, ALPHONSE MARIE LOUIS PRAT DE. 



asi 



de Bourgogne." In April, 1847, he was pro- 

 moted to be an officer of the Legion of Honor ; 

 and was a member of the commission to the 

 Great Exhibition in London in 1851. In con- 

 sequence of differences with the administration, 

 he resigned in 1854 his position as Curator of An- 

 tiquities at the Louvre, and was appointed Di- 

 rector-General of the Archives of the Empire, 

 in 1856. A short time before his death he was 

 elevated to the Senate. His latest works were : 

 "La Renaissance des Arts & la Cour de France," 

 which was to be completed in four volumes 

 8vo., but only three had appeared at his death ; 

 " L'Union des Arts et de 1'Industrie," 2 vols. ; 

 and "Inventaires et Documents publics par 

 Ordre de 1'Empereur." Besides these, M. de 

 Laborde communicated numerous articles to 

 the Revue Archeologique, the Revue des Deux 

 Mondes, and other periodicals. 



LAMARTINE, ALPHONSE MAEIE Louis PEAT 

 DE, a French poet, historian, and statesman, 

 born at Macon, October 21, 1790 ; died in Paris, 

 February 28, 1869. His family name was Prat, 

 but he adopted that by which he was best 

 known on the death of his uncle Lamartine, who 

 left him his name and a considerable legacy. 

 His father had been a cavalry major under 

 the monarchy, and had married Mile. Alix de 

 Roys, daughter of the Duke of Orleans's Inten- 

 dent- General of Finance, and granddaughter to 

 one of the under-governesses of the duke's 

 family. During the Reign of Terror, both his 

 father and mother were imprisoned at Autun, 

 and only escaped the guillotine by the death 

 of Robespierre. After that event they occu- 

 pied a small farm-house at Milly, near Macon, 

 and young Lamartine received his early edu- 

 cation from his mother, of whose gentle man- 

 ners and loving instruction he has preserved 

 some pleasant reminiscences in his "Confi- 

 dences." In 1805 he was sent to the college 

 at Lyons, and soon after transferred to the 

 Jesuits' school of the " Fathers of the Faith," 

 at Belley, where he remained till 1809. It was 

 at this period that he formed that attachment 

 for his young neighbor Elvira which he has 

 made classic in the history of Graziella, in 

 "Les Confidences." His parents, to divert him 

 from this attachment, sent him first to Paris 

 and then to Italy. He remained abroad for a 

 considerable time, and, soon after his return, 

 in 1814, entered the army of the Bourbons, 

 which he did not quit until the close of the 

 " Hundred Days." He had already made some 

 essays in the way of poetry, and several of his 

 early dramas were regarded by Talma as full 

 of promise. It was not, however, till 1820 

 that Lamartine took an acknowledged rank as 

 a poet of the first order. In that year appeared 

 his "Meditations Poe"tiques," including numer- 

 ous pieces which at once gave him national 

 fame, from the evidence they displayed of 

 commanding genius and the force with which 

 they struck some of the most sensitive chords 

 in the breasts of his countrymen. The volume 

 had an immense sale, no fewer than forty-five 



thousand copies having been bought by the 

 public in the space of four years. But it did 

 more for its author than merely give him liter- 

 ary reputation. It opened to him a diplomatic 

 career, and he was appointed attache to the 

 French embassy at Naples. On his way thither 

 he spent some time in Geneva, and renewed 

 his acquaintance with Miss Birch, a young 

 English lady of brilliant talents, a superior 

 artistic education, and considerable wealth, 

 whom he had met the previous year in Savoy, 

 and who was strongly attached to him. The 

 acquaintance ended in a mutual affection and 

 in his marriage, and Madame de Lamartine 

 made him one of the best of wives. After 

 his marriage he became successively secre- 

 tary of the embassy at Naples and at Lon- 

 don, and afterward charge d'affaires in Tus- 

 cany. During all this time Lamartine was 

 enabled to live in splendid style, his wife hav- 

 ing brought him a considerable fortune, to 

 which were added the profits arising from the 

 sale of his works ; but he did not neglect to 

 cultivate the muse, although several of the 

 productions he published at this period were 

 not considered equal to his earlier poetic 

 efforts. Like all poets who have seen her sunny 

 skies, and felt the inspiration of her grand 

 monuments of the past, he loved to sing of 

 Italy ; and in one of his poems, deploring the 

 decadence that had overtaken the country, he 

 employed certain expressions descriptive of the 

 Italians, which led to a duel between him and 

 Colonel Pe"pe, in which he was dangerously 

 wounded. Toward the close of his stay in 

 Italy appeared his "Harmonies Poe"tiques et 

 Religieuses," in which he stood forth as the 

 brilliant and ardent defender of the religion and 

 government, and which had the effect of add- 

 ing immensely to his already great renown. 

 This was in 1829, in which year he returned to 

 France, and was elected a member of the 

 French Academy. On the outbreak of the 

 Revolution of 1830, advances were made to 

 him by the new government ; but these he de- 

 clined, his self-respect, as he said, forbidding 

 that he should take office under the monarchy 

 which had supplanted that he had all along 

 been serving. He became a candidate, how- 

 ever, for a seat in the Chamber of Deputies, 

 but failed to obtain it, the result of which was 

 that, dismissing politics for a time from his 

 mind, he resolved to gratify a wish he had 

 long felt, of visiting the East. The book in 

 which Lamartine relates his travels in the 

 East has obtained a world-wide fame, despite 

 its extravagances, occasional inelegancies, and 

 frequent geographical errors, and it well de- 

 serves its great reputation, for never before 

 had poet travelled under such conditions, and 

 never before had traveller described, with such 

 poetic power, the varying scenes and incidents 

 of journeyings by sea and land. Lamartine 

 went to the East in his own vessel, equipped 

 and armed by himself. He took his wife and 

 his daughter with him- he had a splendid 



