LAST DAYS AND DEATH 



57 



of Paris for December 23, 1829, were celebrated on the 

 Sunday previous in the Church of Saint-M^dard, his 

 parish. From the church the remains were borne to 

 the cemetery of Montparnasse. At the interment, 

 which took place December 30, M. Latreille, in the 

 name of the Academy of Sciences, and M. Geoffroy 

 St. Hilaire, in the name and on behalf of his col- 

 leagues, the Professors of the Museum of Natural 

 History, pronounced eulogies at the grave. The 

 eulogy prepared by Cuvier, and published after his 

 death, was read at a session of the Academy of 

 Sciences, by Baron Silvestre, November 26, 1832. 



With the exception of these formalities, the great 

 French naturalist, " the Linn^ of France," was buried 

 as one forgotten and unknown. We read with aston- 

 ishment, in the account by Dr. A. Mondifere, who 

 made zealous inquiries for the exact site of the grave 

 of Lamarck, that it is and forever will be unknown. 

 It is. a sad and discreditable, and to us inexplicable, 

 fact that his remains did not receive decent burial. 

 They were not even deposited in a separate grave, 

 but were thrown into a trench apparently situated 

 apart from the other graves, and from which the bones 

 of those thrown there were removed every five years. 

 They are probably now in the catacombs of Paris, 

 mingled with those of the thousands of unknown or 

 paupers in that great ossuary. * 



* Dr. Mondiere in L' Homme, iv. p. 2gi, and Lamarck. Par tin 

 Groupe de Trans formistes , p. 271. A somewhat parallel case is that 

 of Mozart, who was buried at Vienna in the common ground of St. 

 Marx, the exact position of his grave being- unknown. There were no 

 ceremonies at his grave, and even his friends followed him no farther 

 than the city gates, owing to a violent storm. — ( Tht Century Cyclo- 

 pedia of Name 5^ 



