of the temperament of his mind. He seems for a time to have allowed the subject wholly to engross his thoughts; to have occupied himself with nothing but plants, and to have associated almost exclusively with botanists. He was a frequent visitor at the house of M. de Jussieu, whose celebrity drew around him all who devoted themselves to this branch of science. Whenever a new collection of plants arrived in Paris, Lamarck was the first to inspect it; and when the celebrated Sonnerat returned from India in 1781, he was so much pleased with Lamarck's enthusiasm, as contrasted with the comparative indifference of most other naturalists, that he presented him with the magnificent herbarium which he had made in the east. It is to zeal like this that we are entitled to look for the achievement of the highest results in science.
Notwithstanding the patronage of Buffon, and others having the greatest influence with the government, it was long before Lamarck succeeded in obtaining any permanent and lucrative appointment. His chief dependence was on the casual and precarious engagements which he formed with booksellers, according to whose direction he was obliged to labour; a painful restraint to a man of genius, impatient to develope his own conceptions in whatever way he judged best fitted to render them effective. He was at length nominated by M. de la Billardiere, a relation of his own, to a place which seems to have been created expressly for him, by which the duty was assigned him of keeping the herbaria in
