BARON CUVIER. ^77 



often nailed up before tlie paste was dry. But 

 although he was perfectly happy while thus 

 engaged, he could not be alone, and, fetching 

 his daughter-in-law back as often as she escaped 

 from him, he associated her in all his contri- 

 vances. On unpacking a portrait of this ever 

 ready companion by Sir Thomas Lawrence, and 

 sent over from England, he happened to be pre- 

 sent ; and, in order to prevent him from seeing it 

 by degrees, and so destroying the effect, she was 

 obliged to hold her hands over his eyes, or he 

 could not have resisted the desire to look. When 

 he sent a commission to this country, every suc- 

 ceeding letter brought an enquiry as to its 

 execution, or a recommendation to use zealous 

 despatch. I must add, that the thanks were as 

 often repeated as the injunctions. It is, perhaps, 

 a curious inconsistency, that a man who sub- 

 mitted to such tedious and minute labour as he 

 had all his life undergone, should be thus impa- 

 tient when the activity of others was in question ; 

 but it must be recollected, that he found very 

 few who would work as he did ; and that, while 

 so working, his mind was absorbed by every step 

 which was taken to ensure the wished-for result, 

 and had no time to bound over the space between 

 thought and execution. " M. Cuvier possessed 



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