C U V I E R. 



WE must once more turn our attention to the Continent, in 

 order to acquire a notion of the enormous impulse given 

 to natural history, and the vast improvements effected in 

 scientific zoology by the genius of the illustrious Cuvier. 

 Georges Cuvier was born on the 23d of August 1769, at 

 Montbeliard, in the department of Doubs, then belonging 

 to Wiirtemberg. His father was a retired military man, 

 and was descended from a Protestant family, which had 

 been forced to emigrate from the Jura by the persecutions 

 directed against the Huguenots. Georges Cuvier was a 

 delicate and studious child, and early showed a marked 

 predilection for natural history. When fourteen years old, 

 he was placed at the academy of Stuttgart the school of 

 Schiller and of other well-known men and after a brilliant 

 career as a student, he entered the world to seek for his 

 living, at the age of eighteen. A short space of time sub- 

 sequent to his leaving the academy of Stuttgart was spent 

 as 'sous-lieutenant' in the Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux; 

 but this corps being disbanded, and his family being unable 

 to give him any pecuniary assistance, he accepted the posi- 

 tion of tutor in the family of the Comte d'Hericy, who 



