We have had countless instances of “the ruling passion strong in death;” but perhaps we can adduce nothing more illustrative of that feeling than the following fact, which may vie with the sublimity of Rousseau’s death, when he desired to look on the sun ere his eyes were closed in the rayless tomb:—­M.  Daubenton, the scientific colleague of Buffon, and the anatomical illustrator of his “Histoire Naturelle,” on being chosen a member of the Conservative Senate, was seized with apoplexy the first time he assisted at the sessions of that body, and fell senseless into the arms of his astonished colleagues.  The most prompt assistance could only restore him to feeling for a few moments, during which he showed himself, what he had always been—­a tranquil observer of nature. He felt with his fingers, which still retained sensation, the various parts of his body, and pointed out to the assistants the progress of the disease! He died on the 31st of December, 1799.  The Edinburgh Philosophical Journal states, “it may be said of him, that he attained happiness the most perfect, and the least mixed, that any man could hope to attain.  His life was marked by an undeviating pursuit of science; and to him was Buffon indebted for instruction and example.  Naturally of a mild and conciliatory disposition, and gifted with cool and dispassionate consideration, he was just such a preceptor as was calculated to curb the imagination of Buffon, whose fiery and ardent genius was apt to substitute theory for proof, and fancy for fact; and often did the ‘biting smile’ of M. Daubenton check the ardency of Buffon, and his well-weighed words arrest him in his headlong progress.”  What more noble picture of scientific devotion can we imagine than the feeble and aged Daubenton, shut up for whole days in his cabinet of natural history, ardently exerting himself in the complex and weary task of arranging the objects according to their several relations?  But Buffon, with the wayward negligence which clings to genius, did wrong to his friend in publishing an edition of his “Histoire Naturelle” without the dissections.  Yet such a step, discountenanced by all the liberal body of science, was forgiven by the philosophic and gentle Daubenton; and Buffon made atonement for his aberration, by re-uniting himself to the companion of his childhood, the participator in his studies, and the preceptor of his genius.

H.

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STORY ON A MARCH.

An officer in India, whose stock of table-linen had been completely exhausted during the campaign,—­either by wear or tear or accident,—­had a few friends to dine with him.  The dinner being announced to the party, seated in the al fresco drawing-room of a camp, the table appeared spread with eatables, but without the usual covering of a cloth.  The master, who, perhaps, gave himself but little trouble about these matters, or who probably relied upon his