320 HIS EARLY CAREER. 



with plates, fell into bis hands in his twelfth year. Latin 

 and Greek were among his first studies ; he learned them 

 as by intuition, and German with equal facility. He 

 also made himself master of most of the modern lan- 

 guages. He had a passion for all kinds of reading, 

 especially for history, the driest details of which he mas- 

 tered, and remembered without an effort. 



Proficient at the age of fourteen in all the branches of 

 study taught in the school of Montbeliard, he was sent 

 to the Caroline Academy, at Stuttgard, where he re- 

 mained four years. His favourite study was the science 

 of government, which was one of the five different facul- 

 ties in which lessons were given at this academy. His 

 great mental endowments w r ere at once recognised by the 

 professors, and by none more warmly than M. Abel, the 

 professor of Natural History, who rekindled in the mind 

 of the young student his early taste for that science. 



When the Revolution broke out, Cuvier was residing 

 in Normandy. Here he met the naturalist, Jessier, w r ho 

 discovered his scientific attainments, and put him in 

 communication with the savans of Paris. He repaired 

 thither in 1795, when the fury of the Revolution had 

 subsided, and by the interest of Jessier and Mellin was 

 appointed a member of the Commission of Arts, and 

 soon after a professor of the School of the Pantheon. 

 For the use of this school he composed a treatise on the 

 natural history of animals, which served as the basis of 

 all subsequent works on zoological classification. From 

 the School of the Pantheon he passed to the Museum of 

 Natural History, where he filled the chair of Comparative 

 Anatomy. When Bonaparte returned from Egypt, in 

 1800, he w r as secretary to the National Institute. The 



