The Jardin dates its origin as far back as Louis XIII., when the king's physician recommended its foundation for science. The French are fond of gardening, and are good gardeners; and the climate is peculiarly favourable to flowers, as is evident from the market held every morning in summer by the side of the Madeleine, where the greatest abundance of the richest flowers I ever saw is laid out for the luxury of the Parisians. The Jardin, patronised by kings and nobles, flourished through successive reigns; but the appointment of Buffon, about the middle of the eighteenth century, suddenly raised it to the pinnacle of European celebrity. The most eloquent writer of his time, (in the style which the French call eloquence,) a man of family, and a man of opulence, he made Natural History the _fashion_, and in France that word is magic. It accomplishes everything--it includes everything. All France was frantic with the study of plants, animals, poultry-yards, and projects for driving tigers in cabriolets, and harnessing lions _à la Cybele_. But Buffon mixed good sense with his inevitable _charlatanrie_--he selected the ablest men whom he could find for his professors; and in France there is an extraordinary quantity of "ordinary" cleverness--they gave amusing lectures, and they won the hearts of the nation. But the Revolution came, and crushed all institutions alike. Buffon, fortunate in every way, had died in the year before, in 1788, and was thus spared the sight of the general ruin. The Jardin escaped, through some plea of its being national property; but the professors had fled, and were starving, or starved. The Consulate, and still more the Empire, restored the establishment. Napoleon was ambitious of the character of a man of science, he was a member of the Institute, he knew the French character, and he flattered the national vanity, by indulging it with the prospect of being at the head of human knowledge. The institution had by this time been so long regarded as a public show that it was beginning to be regarded as nothing else. Gratuitous lectures, which are always good for nothing, and to which all kinds of people crowd with corresponding profit, were gradually reducing the character of the Jardin; when Cuvier, a man of talent, was appointed to one of the departments of the institution, and he instantly revived its popularity; and, what was of more importance, its public use.