In other departments of the civil
service into which he was successively called, as Master of Requests,
Counsellor of State, President of the Section of the Interior,
Director of Protestant Worship, (for he was an enlightened and liberal
Protestant, and watched over the interests of his co-religionists with
constant solicitude,) and at last as a Peer of France--in all these he
displayed the same superiority of talent. The office of Censor of the
Press, which was offered to him, he, to his eternal honour, refused.
Such was the man whose loss the world has now to deplore: but the mind
that traced her age and history--in the wrecks of ages dug from her
bosom--will live for ever in his works to enlighten and instruct
mankind.--_Foreign Quarterly Review._
Cuvier is said to have died of a paralytic affection of the
oesophagus. His body was examined by several eminent pathologists:
his brain is stated to have presented a mass of extraordinary volume,
weighing three pounds thirteen and a half ounces; a fact which will
be treasured up by contemporary phrenologists as evidence of Cuvier's
great intellectual capabilities.
[Cuvier was Professor of Geology in the College of France. The chair,
vacant by his death, has just been filled by the appointment of
M. Elie Beaumont, celebrated for his investigation of mountain
formations.
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