104 HEROES OF SCIENCE. 



discontent within the town. A revolution occurred, 

 and a provisional committee occupied the position 

 of the former Government. Strangely enough this 

 occurred whilst De Candolle's father was chief 

 magistrate, and the Government fell whilst he was 

 in office. Of course the man who had done so 

 much for the town was obliged to go into exile, 

 and he left for his little estate at Champagne, 

 leaving his son behind to pursue his studies. The 

 youth was left under the charge of his tutor, a 

 young married man, and much good work was 

 done, and in 1793 he rejoined his father. During 

 the next year M. Vaucher gave some lectures 

 on botany in the very modest little Botanical 

 Garden of Geneva. He was a clergyman and 

 Professor of Theology, but his amusements led him 

 to study plants, and especially those which live 

 in fresh water. His manner of teaching and the 

 subject, attracted De Candolle, and indeed so much 

 so that he felt that botany would be his special 

 study through life. What he learned from M. 

 Vaucher was about the principal organs of plants, 

 and he began to get books describing plants and 

 to endeavour to describe for himself. Singularly 

 enough, the methodical courses of study which De 

 Candolle had undergone assisted him ; for although 

 he obtained some botanical works of a very in- 

 different kind, which would have satisfied most 

 youths, he began to see their errors of method. 

 Knowing nothing of the labours of the great 

 botanists, the youth managed to see his way to the 



