THE EOYAL MEKAGEEIE OF FRANCE AND THE NATIONAL 

 MENAGERIE ESTABLISHED ON THE 14th OF BRUMAIRE 

 OF THE YEAR II (NOVEMBER 4, 1793). 



By Dr. E. T. Hamy.^ 



Gentlemen : It was a hundred years ago, within a few days, that 

 the National Convention, on a motion made by its committee on public 

 instruction, founded the Museum of Natural History. It was the 10th 

 of June, 1793; the proscribed Girondins were arousing the provinces, 

 the Yendean bands had taken possession of Saumur after a bloody day, 

 and the imperial army of Austria was bombarding Valenciennes and 

 reducing Conde. Yet, in the midst of these frightful disasters, at a 

 time when everything seemed irrevocably lost, there were found some 

 indomitable men, like Josei)h Lakenal and Daubenton, sufficiently reso- 

 lute to brave the existing storm, sufficiently clear-sighted to prepare for 

 the future. The decree, of which they were the joint authors, profoundly 

 transformed the old Royal Garden of medicinal plants that Louis XIII 

 had formally created. In a short time, thanks to the feverish activity 

 of the corps of professors that carried on the rejunevated establish- 

 ment, there was organized an extensive scheme of special instruction, 

 embracing in its twelve courses the entire range of natural history and 

 its applications; a large library was brought together, a menagerie was 

 improvised, and at last the new galleries were ready to receive collec- 

 tions of every kind, found in convents or in the houses of (Emigres, nota- 

 bly at Chantilly, at the Palais Royal, and at Saint- Victor. 



These various developments of the new museum, which had been 

 planned as far back as 1790 by a group of scientific men composed of 

 Daubenton, Fourcroy, Thouin, Jussieu, and others, rapidly formed upon 

 this foundation a sort of metropolis of natural sciences. 



All of its institutions have been copied in the various countries of the 

 globe, but one of them has caused the others to be almost forgotten. 

 This one has remained up to the present time one of the best known 

 and the most popular in France. It is at once suggested when we speak 

 of the Jardin des Plantes : I refer to the menagerie of Etienne Geofl'roy- 

 Saint-Hilaire and of Frederic Cuvier. 



It is concerning this celebrated institution that I wish to speak to 

 you. It is its beginning that I propose to recall on the occasion of the 



1 A discourse delivered at the general session of the Thirty-first Congrfes des Soci^tes 

 Savantes. Translated from the Nouvelles Archives du Museum d'HistoireNaturelle, 

 3me S6rie, tome 5me, pages 1-15. 



507 



