MEMOIR OF LATREILLE. 35 



that, as being the object of the most assiduous and 

 tender care, he was happy in spite of his sufferings 

 and infirmities. This devoted affection was never 

 for an instant relaxed, and he saw renewed, in his 

 own case, that beautiful example of filial piety 

 which he had so often witnessed in the same place 

 which he himself inhabited in his turn. In fact, in 

 the very same house, the tenderness of a daughter 

 had prolonged the days of a blind and infirm father. 

 This old man was De Lamarck, the friend of M. 

 Latreille, whom he succeeded, and whom he called 

 his adopted father, when taking a last farewell of 

 him when he was on the brink of the grave." 



But his increasing debility did not prevent him 

 altogether from prosecuting his favourite occupation. 

 In fact, several memoirs on insects, and no incon- 

 siderable portion of his last work, the " Cours d'En- 

 tomologie," were written as he lay in bed propped 

 up with pillows. Even in the beginning of the 

 week on which he died, eager to withdraw his 

 mind, if possible, from his sufferings by engaging 

 in study, he corrected the proofs of his last produc- 

 tion, namety, a description of a new genus of Crus- 

 tacea, which he named Vrosopistome. But this 

 could not last ; nature at length gave way, and he 

 died on the morning of the 6th February, 1832, 

 aged seventy years and three months. 



Among the many individuals and learned societies 

 who bewailed Latreille's death, the Entomological 

 Society claimed the preference in doing honour to 

 their late president. It was determined that the 



