Life of Count Rumford. 615 



plied efforts for making food more healthful, more agreeable, 

 and, above all, more economical ; what service he has rendered 

 to humanity in introducing the general use of the soups which 

 go by his own name, and which have been so invaluable to so 

 many thousands of persons exposed to the horrors of the pre- 

 vailing scarcity ? Who has not been made acquainted with his 

 effective methods for suppressing mendicity ; with his Houses 

 of Industry, for work and instruction ; with his means for im- 

 proving the construction of chimneys, of lamps, of furnaces, of 

 baths, of heating by steam ; and, in fine, with his varied under- 

 takings in the cause of domestic economy ? 



" In England, in France, in Germany, in all parts of the 

 continent, the people are enjoying the blessings of his dis- 

 coveries ; and, from the humble dwelling of the poor even to the 

 palaces of sovereigns, all will remember that his sole aim was to 

 be always useful to his fellow-men. 



" Alas \ death has snatched him away in the midst of his 

 labors. Pitiless death has removed him from those to whom 

 he consecrated his existence. But his spirit survives on this 

 terrestrial orb. His genius, smiling over us, lifts itself heaven- 

 ward, and he goes to take one of the high places prepared for 

 the benefactors of humanity." 



The Countess has copied on the manuscript contain- 

 ing the above tribute a stanza which, she says, was 

 written by a noble lady, almost an octogenarian, of high 

 spirit and sensibility, to express her admiring homage 

 to Rumford. I copy this in the original. 



" Bienfaiteur de I'humanit^ 

 Grand sans effort et sans envie, 

 II n'a dploy son genie 

 QIJC pour signaler sa bont." 



Baron Cuvier, Perpetual Secretary of the French 

 Institute, and a very intimate friend of Count Rum- 

 ford, performed the customary service by delivering 

 an //oge upon the deceased before his associates, on the 



