STUDENT LIFE AND BOTANICAL CAREER 2 1 



with visiting the foreign botanical gardens and 

 museums, and of placing them in communication 

 with those of Paris. His travels extended through 

 portions of the years 178 1 and 1782. 



According to his own statement,* in pursuit of this 

 object he collected not only rare and interesting plants 

 which were wanting in the Royal Garden, but also min- 

 erals and other objects of natural history new to the 

 Museum. He went to Holland, Germany, Hungary, 

 etc., visiting universities, botanical gardens, and mu- 

 seums of natural history. He examined the mines 

 of the Hartz in Hanover, of Freyburg in Saxony, of 

 Chemnitz and of Cremnitz in Hungary, making there 

 numerous observations which he incorporated in his 

 work on physics, and sent collections of ores, minerals, 

 and seeds to Paris. He also made the acquaintance 

 of the botanists Gleditsch at Berlin, Jacquin at Vienna, 

 and Murray at Gottingen. He obtained some idea 

 of the magnificent establishments in these countries 

 devoted to botany, " and which," he says, " ours do not 

 yet approach, in spite of all that had been done for 

 them during the last thirty years." \ 



On his return, as he writes, he devoted all his ener- 

 gies and time to research and to carrying out his great 

 enterprises in botany ; as he stated: " Indeed, for the 

 last ten years my works have obliged me to keep in 

 constant activity a great number of artists, such as 

 draughtsmen, engravers, and printers." % 



* See letters to the Committee of Public Instruction. 



f Cuvier's &loge, p. viii ; also Bourguignat in Revue Hog. Soc. Ma- 

 lacologique, p. 67. 



\ He received no remuneration for this service. As was afterwards 

 stated in the National Archives, ^tat des personnel attaches au Mu- 



