296 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



canvass De Candolle called upon Adanson, then very aged, 

 and in his dotage more eccentric than ever. 



If not chosen into the Institute, which indeed he could not 

 pretend to expect, De Candolle was in that year made a mem- 

 ber of that active association, — " la pepiniere de l'Academie 

 des Sciences," — the Societe Philomathique, and was soon 

 placed on the committee in charge of its Bulletin. This 

 brought him into intimate connection with such colleagues 

 as Brongniart (Alex.), Dumeril, Cuvier, Biot, Lacroix, and 

 Sylvestre. 



" We met, at each other's lodgings, on Saturday evenings, after the 

 session of the society, to read and to discuss the morceaux intended 

 for the Bulletin, and when our labor was finished we took tea to- 

 gether and chatted familiarly. As one by one we exchanged the 

 celibate for the married state, our wives were introduced ; — then 

 we no longer read our extracts, and at length we gave over making 

 the Bulletin, but we kept up our Saturday evening reunions. It was 

 in consequence of this that Cuvier continued long afterwards his 

 Saturday evening receptions ; but I return to the year 1800." 



By De Candolle's account he was by about ten years the 

 youngest member of this reunion. Yet he has the name of 

 Biot and Dumeril on his list, both of whom survived him for 

 twenty years ; and Biot was really not quite four years his 

 senior, and Dumeril only five. 



As a member of this select circle of intimate friends and 

 zealous savans, all then pressing on to the very highest dis- 

 tinction, we may well believe that the ambitious young bota- 

 nist enjoyed, and improved to the full, such golden opportuni- 

 ties, that he learned something of every branch of natural 

 history, and also — what was no less useful at Paris — "a 

 connaitre les hommes et les mobiles caches de bien des 

 choses." 



De Candolle sketches the following portraits of three of his 

 associates, Dumeril, Cuvier, and Lacroix. And first of 



" The excellent Dumeril. He was the ideal of the frank charac- 

 ter which we attribute to the Picards. He was a sincere and devoted 

 friend, always ready to second and render any service to me and 



