describing, all the strange animals
that come from every quarter of the globe to this little corner of the
boulevard Montmartre, thence to be distributed among the collections of
Europe and America.

There may one listen to sallies of fancy, scientific discussion,
episodes of likely and unlikely adventures, tales that make one burst
with laughter, histories that fill the eyes with tears, real dramas that
freeze the soul with horror, and of which the historian is almost always
the hero. In the midst of all this noise of conversation and going and
coming, the master of the establishment loses not a moment. He issues
orders, he lends a helping hand; he classes, describes, and attends to
strangers: and occasionally sends as presents to other museums
unparalleled treasures of natural history. Just let us mention, _en
passant_, that the museum of Paris has been loaded for twenty years back
with his precious gifts. At each step you take in the galleries, you may
read his name inscribed upon numerous objects, before which the curious
in such matters stop with surprise, and the learned with admiration.

One evening, he was laboring with his usual feverish activity to form
collections of shells, according to their species, and after the method
of Lamarck; for to popularize science is his fervent desire and constant
aim. These collections would not nearly reimburse him for the trouble
and cost bestowed upon them; but they would create a few conchologists
the more; they would facilitate the studies of those who had already
commenced their initiation into the marvels of a science so attractive,
by the beautiful objects to which it consecrates itself, and this was
what the enthusiastic _savant_ wished above all.

"Ah!" said one of the visitors, taking up a shell, "I never see a
spiral, without calling to mind a drama that was once enacted here, and
which I will relate to you:

"It was eight or ten years ago, one evening, as it might be to-day. The
smoke from five or six cigars filled the laboratory with its fantastic
rings. A lamp, vailed under a semi-opaque shade, served only to render
more visible the shadows of this strange chamber. Here and there, the
glow from the hearth illuminated animals from all parts of the world,
hung at random upon the walls, which they confusedly burdened. The
master of the magazine took up a shell which chance placed under his
hand, and presented it to a tall man, hoary with age, who was silently
s