HA U Y H A V ANNAH. 



649 



4cols ffc* mines, and the directory had created him 

 professor in the Normal school, and secretary of the 

 commissioners appointed to regulate weights and mea- 

 sures, the result of whose labours was the new decima 

 system ; he was also made a member of the national 

 institute. Bonaparte appointed him professor of miner- 

 alogy in the museum of natural history, and afterwards 

 professor in the academy of Paris. By his influence, 

 the study of mineralogy received a new impulse ; the 

 collections were increased fourfold, and excellently 

 arranged. He was a most obliging and instructive 

 superintendent of this collection. In 1803, at the 

 command of Napoleon, he wrote his Traite de Phy- 

 sique, in six months. Being directed to ask some fa- 

 vour, he asked for a place for the husband of his niece. 

 Napoleon granted his request, besides conferring on 

 the modest savant a pension of 6000 francs. The 

 esteem which the emperor had for this distinguished 

 man was the more honourable both to him and to 

 Hauy, as the latter had never stooped to flattery, and 

 had even opposed Bonaparte's elevation to the im- 

 perial dignity, by signing nay, when the question was 

 proposed for the ratification of the nation. When 

 the emperor, after his return from Elba, visited the 

 museum, he said to Hauy, " I read your Physics again 

 in Elba, with the greatest interest;" he then decor- 

 ated Hauy with the badges of the legion of honour. 

 Hauy was in the habit of amusing himself by convers- 

 ing with the pupils of the Normal school, who often 

 visited at his house, and whom he always received 

 and entertained with kindness. He was gentle, in- 

 dulgent, and benevolent. Nothing could ruffle his 

 quiet temper but objections to his system. Notwith- 

 standing his feebleness, he attained the age of nearly 

 eighty years, and died June 3, 1822. Besides his 

 valuable treatises in different periodicals, and his 

 articles on natural history in the Encyclopedic Me- 

 thodique, his Essai sur la Theorie, et la Structure des 

 Cristaux (1 784), his Traite de Mineralogie (1801, 4 

 vols.), his Traite elementaire de Physique, which has 

 already been mentioned (1803, 2 vols.), his Traite 

 desCaracteres physiques des Pierres precieuses (1817), 

 hisTraile de Cristallographie (1822, 2 vols., with en- 

 gravings), his Traite de Mineralogie (2 edit., 1822, 4 

 vols., with an atlas,), are the most distinguished. 

 The charge of editing the manuscripts which he left, 

 devolved on his pupil Lafosse. The duke of Buck- 

 ingham bought his precious collection of minerals, for 

 which Hauy had refused an ofler of 600,000 francs. 

 Cuvier delivered a eulogy on him before the academy 

 in 1823, and Brogniart, who had been his assistant, be- 

 came his successor, in the museum of natural history. 

 HAUY, VALENTIN, a younger brother of the pre- 

 ceding, born in 1746, he was the founder of the in- 

 stitution for the blind at Paris. Previous to this, he 

 was an instructor in the art of calligraphy at Paris. 

 When, in 1783, the blind pianist Mile. Paradis, of 

 Vienna, gave a concert at Paris, the manner in which 

 she was able to read any thing, written or printed, 

 by means of pins placed on it, and the manner in 

 which she had become acquainted with geography, 

 by the aid of maps in relief, constructed by \V eissen- 

 burg, a blind man of Manheim, excited Hauy's atten- 

 tion. He took a poor blind boy, by the name of 

 Lesueur, who displayed an active mind, into his house, 

 instructed him for some time, and then presented 

 him to the philanthropic society. This society sup- 

 plied him with the funds necessary to establish an in- 

 stitution, according to his plan, for twelve blind boys. 

 Soon after, this new institution for the blind was 

 united with that for the deaf and dumb, by the re- 

 commendation of the duke de la Rochefoucault, and 

 removed to a building which had been a convent of 

 the Celestines. It soon appeared, that the two kinds 

 of unfortunates disagreed entirely, that their dislike 



for each other increased every day ; and at length 

 (1794) it became absolutely necessary to divide the 

 institution. But after this separation, the establish- 

 ment for the blind did not flourish so well as that for 

 the deaf and dumb. Hauy himself was partly to 

 blame for this. With an excellent heart, lie was not 

 sufficiently attentive to the proper management ot 

 the affairs of the establishment ; and, instead of an- 

 swering the design of the institution, which was to 

 supply, as far as possible, the lost sense of the blind, 

 he made it merely a comfortable residence for them. 

 It was therefore abandoned, under the consular 

 government, and the pupils were placed in the hospi- 

 tal of the Quinze-Vingts, with which establishment 

 they remained connected for fourteen years, until, at 

 length, in February, 1815, Guillie, received orders to 

 establish an institution in another place, and to orga- 

 nize it in an improved manner. Hauy had involved him- 

 self in many difficulties by his hasty union with an un- 

 educated woman, and was not successful in his attempt, 

 after the abolition of the public institution, to establish 

 a boarding-school for the blind (iheMusee desAveugles). 

 Notwithstanding the pension of 2000 francs, which 

 he continued to receive from the government, his 

 circumstances became more and more embarrassed ; 

 he therefore accepted an invitation to superintend, 

 at St Petersburg, under the patronage of the 

 empress-mother, an institution for the instruction of 

 the blind, in which his scholar Fournier was to be 

 his assistant. But this undertaking did not succeed, 

 and he returned to Paris in 1806, where he lived, 

 with his brother the mineralogist, until his death, in 

 April, 1822. In the revolution, of which he was a 

 warm admirer, he took no share ; but, during the 

 directorial government, he was, together with La 

 Reveillere-Lepaux, one of the heads of the (so called) 

 theophilanthropists. His Essai sur I'Education det 

 Aveugles (Paris, 1786, 4to) was printed with letters 

 in relief, so that the blind could trace the lines with 

 their fingers, and thus feel the letters and words. 



HAUYNE ; a mineral so named by Brunn Neer- 

 gaard, in honour of the celebrated abbe Hauy. It was 

 first discovered by the abbe Gismondi, who named it 

 latialite, from Latium, the ancient name of the coun- 

 try where it occurs. Nose, who observed it in the trap- 

 rocks of Andernach, considered it as allied to sap- 

 phire, and described under the name of saphirin; but 

 more recent examinations of its properties prove it to 

 be identical with the species called lazulite by Hauy. 



HAVANA, or HAVANNAH (Spanish, La Ha- 

 bana, that is, the harbour) ; " the ever faithful city of 

 St Christopher of the Havana," capital of the island 

 of Cuba, and of the province and government of the 

 same name ; situated on the northern coast of the 

 island, at the mouth of the river Lagiza, with the sea 

 in its front. Lat. N. 23 9' 24" ; Ion. W. 82 23'. 

 Population, exclusive of the garrison and strangers, is 

 94,023 46,621 whites, 9225 mulattoes (of whom 1010 

 are slaves,) and 38,177 negroes (of whom 22,830 

 are slaves.) The total population is calculated 

 at 112,023. The Havannah is the residence of a 

 captain-general, and the see of a bishop. It is the 

 most important commercial port in Spanish America, 

 and is considered as the key of the West Indies. The 

 liarbour is not only the best in the island, but is 

 esteemed by many as the best in the world, on 

 account of its strength, and because it is capable of 

 containing commodiously 1000 ships, without either 

 cable or anchor, there being generally six fathoms 

 of water in the bay. The entrance into the harbour 

 s by a narrow channel, about a thousand feet wide 

 at its entrance, so difficult of access that only one 

 vessel can enter at a time. It is strongly fortified 

 with platforms, works, and artillery, for half a mile, 

 which is the length of the passage ; and the mouth 



