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and Illyria ; yet undertook also researches into the enigmatical 
fossiliferous deposits of the Tarentaise, to which, about that time, 
M. Elie de Beaumont had called fresh attention. 
I cannot but pause to remark, that had M. Necker resolutely set 
himself to publish at that time his most elaborate and persevering 
researches on countries even yet so little known to geologists as the 
Southern and Eastern Alps, he would have obtained a distinguished 
rank amongst the foremost field-geologists of his day. There is no 
doubt but that almost to the close of his life he was looking forward 
to still effecting the publication of what he knew had been too long 
delayed, yet of which he could not but be aware of the value. 
We have now reached the year 1829, when Necker was forty- 
three years of age, and from this period we may probably trace the 
commencement of the second and far less happy stage of his life. 
As one of his attached countrymen observes, in a letter to me, the 
two phases were so unlike, that they might seem to have belonged 
to different individuals ; the first period marked by the greatest 
bodily and mental activity, exuberant spirits, and relish for society ; 
the second by comparative indolence, too often by moody reserve, 
and a painful tendency to misconstrue the kindest intentions of his 
warmest friends. One of the latter informs me that when he saw 
him as late as 1824, he was, to use a homely phrase, “blithe as a 
bee;” and I have no doubt that it was about 1829 that his health 
began to fail, — partly, one may believe, in consequence of the effects 
upon a nervous, though wiry constitution, of the very prolonged and 
laborious pedestrian journeys which he had previously made through 
countries often inhospitable and sometimes insalubrious. One 
evidence of the change in his health, was his seeking variety of 
scene, and a less rigorous winter climate than that of G-eneva, by 
returning once more to his well-remembered Scotland. 
My acquaintance with M. Necker commenced at Edinburgh in 
November or December 1831. The exact date is recalled to me by 
having first heard from him (then just arrived from London) of 
the brilliant discoveries which Mr Faraday had communicated 
to the Eoyal Society, on the derivation of electric currents from 
permanent magnets. I can even now recall the spot on which M. 
Necker first made me acquainted with this grand result. The 
privilege of making his acquaintance was to me at the time a great 
