Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 20.djvu/568

552 natural history. Yet this year be has come out with four volumes on fish, and eight more will appear in two years. He has received between £2,000 and £2,200 for it, whereas no other person in Paris could persuade a librarian to publish one volume for nothing. He is also publishing another edition of his 'Règne Animal,' and other things. He has been very obliging to me, for, on my applying for casts of animals for Mantell, who has been begging in vain for a long time, he gave me an order for whatever I liked; so I have sent off from the museum a huge box with casts of every thing."

"I got into Cuvier's sanctum sanctorum yesterday, and it is truly characteristic of the man. In every part it displays that extraordinary power of methodizing which is the grand secret of the prodigious feats which he performs annually without appearing to give himself the least trouble. But, before I introduce you to his study, I should tell you that there is first the museum of natural history opposite his house, and admirably arranged by himself; then the anatomy museum, connected with his dwelling. In the latter is a library disposed in a suite of rooms, each containing works on one subject. There is one where there are all the works on ornithology, in another room all on ichthyology, in another osteology, in another law books (!) etc., etc. When he is engaged in such works as require continual reference to a variety of authors, he has a stove shifted into one of these rooms, in which everything on that subject is systematically arranged, so that in the same work he often takes the round of many apartments. But the ordinary studio contains no book-shelves. It is a longish room, comfortably furnished, lighted from above, and furnished with eleven desks to stand to, and two low tables, like a public office for so many clerks. But all is for the one man, who multiplies himself as author, and, admitting no one into this room, moves as he finds necessary, or as fancy inclines him, from one occupation to another. Each desk is furnished with a complete establishment of inkstands, pens, pins to pin manuscripts of the same work, etc. There is a separate bell to several desks. The low tables are to sit to when he is tired. The collaborateurs are not numerous, but always chosen well. They save him every mechanical labor, find references, etc., are rarely admitted to the study, receive orders, and speak not."

"Brongniart, who in imitation of Cuvier has many clerks and collaborateurs, is known to lose more time in organizing this auxiliary force than he gains by their work, but this is never the case with Cuvier. When I went to get Mantell's casts, I found that the man who made molds, and the painter of them, had distinct apartments, so that there was no confusion, and the dispatch with which all was executed was admirable. It cost Cuvier a word only."