Documents in Commemoration of Baron Cuvier. 303 



Art. XIII. — Documents in Commemoration of Baron Cuvier. 



Translated for this Journal by Prof. Griscom. 



1. Memoir of G. Cuvier; by A. DeCandolle. 



Europe has sustained an immense and irreparable loss. George 

 Cuvier died on the 13th of May last, after an illness of four days by 

 a paralysis of the throat, which rapidly reached the organs of respi- 

 ration. He was only sixty three years of age, having been born in 

 the month of February of that year (1769) which produced so many 

 remarkable men, — Napoleon, Chateaubriand, Walter Scott, &c. 

 His native town, Montbeliard, since united to France, was then a 

 principality in alliance with Switzerland and dependent on the Duke 

 of Wurtemberg. His early studies were pursued at the Gymnasium 

 of Stuttgardt, and he commenced his career by entering as a sub- 

 lieutenant of the Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux : the dissolution of 

 this corps restored him to liberty, and he passed the whole of the 

 turbulent period of the revolution in the business of education on 

 the borders of the sea in Normandy. It was there, as a first essay 

 of his talent, he made his great anatomical discoveries on the mol- 

 lusca, and overthrew the zoological classifications which had been 

 universally in vogue since the period of Aristotle. 



This work, published in 1795, fixed upon him the attention of the 

 learned world. GeoiFroy St. Hilaire had the honor of first per- 

 ceiving the importance of his discoveries, and contributed to the ad- 

 vancement of their author. Cuvier was called almost immediately 

 to take a part in the class of science of the Institute, and to supply 

 the place of the aged Mertrud as professor of comparative anatomy 

 in the Garden of Plants. His lectures soon became remarkable for 

 their clearness and eloquence, and attracted crowds of students. 

 He appeared at this time to be threatened with phthisis, and he has 



