NATURAL SCIENCES. 



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Perigord, called Bernard Palissy, who, 

 at the age of fivc-and-twenty, left his 

 native village, where he had been earn- ' 

 ing a scanty living as a potter, and 

 start i'd on a journey, staff in hand 

 and wallet on back, through France, 

 Germany, and Holland, practising dif- 

 ferent manual trades at one time 

 glazier, at another geometer, and at 

 another designer. Wherever he went 

 he studied the topography of the dis- 

 trict, the irregularities of the ground, 

 the course of the streams, the mines, 

 and the natural productions and 'spe- 

 cialities of the country. He questioned 

 the inhabitants as to the objects which 

 attracted his attention, and so acquired 

 for himself a scientific education by 

 the sole force of his own intelligence. 

 After five years of wandering, in the 

 course of which he learnt, to .use his 

 own expression, " science with the 

 teeth," he returned home and settled 

 in Saintonge. While continuing his 

 trade of surveyor and painter on glass, 

 he sought to discover the secret of 

 making enamelled pottery (Fig. 92), 

 similar to that which Italy manu- 

 factured with so much skill, and which 

 was much in favour at every court in 

 Europe. Palissy worked at this scheme 

 for ten or twelve years before discover- 

 ing the coloured enamel which he re- 

 quired to cover the pottery. He thus Fig. 02.-Table Ornament, from the Palace of 



. , the Bishop of Lieieux. Enamelled Pottery 

 equalled those whom he had copied, of the sixteenth (> ntu ^._i n the Election 



and he soon surpassed them by making of M. Achille Jubinal. 



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