WOMEN IN THE NATURAL SCIENCES 245 



tive Kussian. Her Monographic de Turb diaries de la Mer 

 Noire, a large and beautifully illustrated volume published 

 at Odessa in 1892, placed her at once among biologists of 

 the first rank. Indeed, so meritorious was this production 

 of the talented daughter of Holy Russia that the Congress 

 of Naturalists in 1893 did not hesitate to recognize its ex- 

 ceptional value by conferring on the fair authoress a spe- 

 cial prize. 



This gifted biologist has since rendered distinct service 

 in the cause of science by her explorations of the Gulf of 

 Naples and the coasts of France. Her activity is pro- 

 digious, and the long list of books and monographs which 

 she has published on the lower forms of marine life in the 

 Black and Mediterranean seas shows that she has a capacity 

 for work that is truly extraordinary. 



Here is, probably, the place to make mention of a woman 

 of encyclopaedic mind, Clemence Augustine Royer, who was 

 born in 1830 in Nantes, France. She wrote on such a va- 

 riety of subjects that it is difficult to classify her. She was 

 in no sense of the word a specialist, and she seems by tem- 

 perament to have been averse to confining herself to any 

 one branch of knowledge. 



Her first work to attract particular attention was one on 

 a topic connected with political economy. A prize had 

 been offered for the discussion of this subject, and the little 

 French woman acquitted herself so well that she had the 

 honor of sharing the prize with the noted Proudhon. She 

 has also written many works on philosophy and physics. 

 Among these are two which attracted considerable notice 

 at the time of their publication. In one of them she attacks 

 the positivism of Comte ; in the other she assails Laplace 's 

 hypothesis regarding the origin of the material universe. 



But the work which made her famous, particularly in 

 France, was her translation into French in 1862 of Dar- 

 win's Origin of Species. It is safe to say that this version 

 created as much of a sensation in France as the original 



