DE SAUSSURE IN SCIENCE AND LITERATURE 455 



journeys without a fellow-traveller. He accounts for this in 

 a letter describing his 1767 tour of Mont Blanc, where he says 

 that his friends hurried him on from Courmayeur before he had 

 completed his work. On the road also he was doubtless kept 

 fully occupied with his notes, and gained by the absence of any 

 distraction. In his dealings with that flighty enthusiast, Bourrit, 

 he was called on for considerable forbearance, which (if he had 

 sometimes to administer private rebukes) he never failed to show 

 in his published writings. Young Bourrit 's diary at Chamonix 

 in 1787 shows that, short of letting them join in his expedition, 

 de Saussure was willing to treat the worthy but vainglorious 

 Precentor and his progeny with much kindliness. 



In Genevese politics de Saussure 's position was remarkable. 

 Born in and closely allied to the old patrician families, he from 

 his youth up clearly foresaw that a great popular movement was 

 approaching throughout Europe, though he probably failed to 

 anticipate how soon the storm would break. An aristocrat by 

 birth and association, he was at heart a liberal, ready to work 

 for the education of the democracy of the future. His inclina- 

 tions did not draw him towards taking a part in the day by 

 day politics of the town, in the constantly recurring struggles 

 between the stubbornness of the Councils and the insistent 

 claims of the burghers and newcomers. Separated though he 

 was both by birth and by mental habit from Rousseau, whom 

 his circle, and Charles Bonnet in particular, denounced as a rash 

 and dangerous agitator, there was a fundamental sympathy in 

 politics between the two men. Rousseau's dictum, 'An aristo- 

 cracy is the best form of government (i.e. administration), but the 

 worst of sovereignty,' comes near to expressing the ultimate 

 object of de Saussure 's efforts during his last years, when he took 

 an active part in the attempt to remodel the constitution of 

 Geneva. 



Early in life, as soon as he was in a position to make his 

 influence felt, he had come forward with a forcible appeal to his 

 fellow-citizens to prepare for the new order by educating their 

 future masters. At the time he was recognised by the unen- 

 franchised classes of the town as their champion, and looked on 

 with grave suspicion by his associates of the Venerable Company. 

 The opposition, apparently unexpected, he met with on this 



