8 CARNOT. 



defatigable, and ingenious cooperator whom, by these 

 traits, each of you has already recognized he discovered 

 Vauquelin ! 



ENTRANCE OF CARNOT INTO THE SCHOOL OF ME- 

 ZIERES AS SECOND LIEUTENANT OF ENGINEERS. 



At the time when Carnot quitted the establishment of 

 M. de Longpre, the " ordonnance " in virtue of which a 

 genealogist cooperated with a geometer in the examina- 

 tion of the future officers of engineers was not in force. 

 In 1771 any Frenchman might still be admitted at the 

 school of Mezieres without showing any parchments, on 

 condition always that neither his father nor mother had 

 endeavoured to enrich their family and their country by 

 commerce or by manual labour. The young aspirant 

 displayed unusual mathematical knowledge before the 

 examiner, Bossut. His father, in obedience to the sad 

 exigencies of the period, proved on his part that no ship 

 of his had ever been to distant countries to exchange the 

 fruits of the French soil or of French industry, for pro- 

 ductions reserved by nature to other climates ; that his 

 hands had never put together the movable types of 

 Gutenberg, even for the . purpose of reproducing the 

 Bible or the Gospel ; that he had not personally co- 

 operated in the construction of any of those admirable 

 instruments which measure time, or which sound the 

 depths of space. 



After legal proof of these negative merits, young 

 Carnot was declared of sufficiently good family to wear 

 an epaulette, and received without delay that of a second 

 lieutenant. 



Decorated with this so-much-desired epaulette, Carnot, 

 at the age of eighteen years, came to the School of En- 



