308 Notice of Antoine Laurent de Jussieu. 



pen of another ; but this impediment did not make him discontinue 

 his exertions. 



We conceive that this, the last work of so illustrious a man, writ- 

 ten when he was about 83 years of age, and yet worthy of the 

 author's best days, will be read with interest by those who may have 

 a desire to compare it with the introduction to the Genera of ] 789. 

 It is besides an homage which ought to be rendered to the memory 

 of an individual who has contributed much to the fame of our coun- 

 try, to lay it before the public ; and we are happy to have it in our 

 power to add it to the present notice.* 



If the labours of M. de Jussieu entitle him to a place in the first 

 rank of savans, he may in addition be held up as a model for 

 amenity of character. He was full of kindness to those who devot- 

 ed themselves to the study of the sciences, and gave every encou- 

 ragement to such as distinguished themselves in the pursuit. En- 

 tirely devoted to the advancement of botany, and searching only for 

 truth, he candidly acknowledged his own errors, and pointed out 

 those of others without asperity. He was never drawn into the po- 

 lemics of science : no example can be cited, either in his work or in 

 his numerous memoirs, of a single word calculated to injure any of 

 his contemporaries, and yet he was the means of advancing the sci- 

 ence much more than those who have combated in support of their 

 views. His were founded on truth, and needed no adventitious sup- 

 port ; left to themselves they have gradually wrought their way into 

 science, till they are now generally admitted. He had the happi- 

 ness, therefore, to join to the distinction he acquired by his scienti- 

 fic superiority, the friendship of all who were able to appreciate him ; 

 and the young, to whom he was remarkably kind, entertained a 

 most filial veneration for him. 



Surrounded by the marks of esteem and friendship, entirely de- 

 voted to the study of the sciences, and never extending his ambition 

 beyond this circle ; — happy in the bosom of a numerous family, and 

 seeing himself survive, so to speak, in a son worthy to bear his name, 

 and who had become even during his lifetime his colleague and suc- 

 cessor, — he passed his long career in the enjoyment of a happiness 

 which he owed as much to himself as to the circumstances in which 

 he happened to be placed ; and at last, in the eighty-eighth year of his 

 age, on the 15th September 1836, a short and not very painful disor- 

 der brought to an easy termination a life which had been spent in so 

 much usefulness and tranquillity. 



* It will appear in the same volume of tlie Annales des Sciences Naturelles 

 from which the above biographical notice has been extracted. 



