Alcide D'orbigny, His Life and His Work
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JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY. FEBRUARY, 1917. ____-_____ .TRANSACTIONS OF THE SOCIETY. _oc I.--P?.esidential Address, 1916-17 : Abide d‘orbigny, his Lifi and his Work. By EDWARDHERON-ALLEN, F.L.S. F.G.S. F.Z.S. P.R.M.S. M.R.I.A., ETC. TO WHICH IS APPENDED A Study of the Foraminifera of the Biscayan Coast of France in the Neighbowhood of La Rochelle. BY EDWARDHERON-ALLEN AXD ARTHUREARLAND. (Read Jsnuary 17, 1917.) PLATESI TO XIII. TABLE OF CONTENTS. PAQE PAQE Introduction ........ 2 Appendices- 1. Early years and studies at La A. The family of d’Orbigny .. 87 Rochelle ........ 3 B. Letter of Charles d’0rbigny 2. The Models ........ 13 to his son, Alcide, 1813 .. 89 3. D’Orbigny’s Generic and Spe- 0. The dates of issue of the cific Names 17 Models ........ 89 4. The ‘LTableauMQthodique de D. The I‘ Cinquieme Ilivraison ” la Cksse des Cbphalopodes ” 19 of the Models ...... 91 5. The ‘‘ Planches Inbdites ” .. 33 E. The Generic and Specific 6. The Revelations of FQlix Du- names of the d’orbignyan jardin ...... 37 Foraminifera ...... 92 7. The Cuba Memdir ...... 43 F. The four Tables of Genera 8. The Canary Islands Memoir .. 46 published by d’Orbigny . 95 9. The South American Memoir 47 G. Species in the “ Tableau MQ- 10. The Paris Chalk Memoir .. 53 thodique ” not diagnosed 11. The Vienna Memoir .... 54 or figured by Parker and 12. The Article “Foraminiferes ” Jones, or by Fornasini .. 99 in the ‘‘ Dictionnaire Uni- €3. Species added to the ‘I Tab- verselle ” .. 58 leau MQthodique” 13. The “ Cours QlBmentke.’’ and de FQrussac .... by 100 the “Prodrome,” 1849-52 .. 59 I. Articles by Fornasini repro- 14. The last years of d’Orbigny .. 68 ducing Berthelin’s trac- 15. The Verdict of Posterity .. 71 ings .. .. *I .. 101 16. Some d‘orbignyan species .. 75 J. The final conoiusions of Du- 17. The Foraminifera of Esnandes jardin ........ 102 and Chatelaillon ...... 80 Bibliography .......... 104 Fd. glst, 1917 B 2 Transactions of the Society. EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. PLATE I.-Alcide d‘orbigny, from a lithograph by Lavallbe, 1839. 11.-Esnandes : The *‘ bouchots,” with a shrimp-catcher. 111.- ,, The ‘I acons ” of the mussel-fishers. 1V.- ,, The fortified church. V.- ,, The house of the d‘Orbigny family (1914). V1.--Fig. 1. The ‘‘ Fleuriau de Bellevue ” Microscope, preserved at La Rochelle. ,, 2. D’Orbigny’s later Microscope, in the possession of Mme. Henri d‘oibigny. VI1.-Alcide d’Orbigny, from a daguerreotype of 1843 in the Musee de Palbon- tologie in Paris. VII1.-Reduced facsimile of the Planche inbdite of “ Rosalina.” 1X.-Ditto of I‘ Rotalia.” X.-Fig. 1. Conulina wnica, after d’0rbigny. ,, 2. Cuneolina pavonia, after d’0rbigny and Carpenter. ,, 3. Uniloczrliltaindica, after d’0rbigny. ,, 4. Cruciloculina triangularis, after d’Orbigny and Carpenter. ,, 5. Rotalia dubia, after Fornasini, from the Planches inbdites. XI.-Esnandes : The strand, at high water-mark. XI1.-Group of Foraminifera from Esnandea. XII1.-Group of Foraminifera from Chatelaillon. INTRODUCTION. THE verdict of posterity upon the work of d’0rbigny was antici- pated by Geoffroy-St. Hilaire and Latreille and by dtr F6russac when they announced to the scientific world in 1825 that ‘(the Order of the Foraminifera was a creation of d’orbigny,” and it was pronoiinced by Parker and Jones in 187’1 when they said: “ with all its faults, and they are neither few nor small, the ‘ Tableau MBthodique ’ by Alcide Dessaliries d’Orbigny niust be regarded as the alphabet of the Nomenclature of the Foramini- fera”;4 by Van den Broeck in 1876, who said: “le ‘Tableau Mkthodique,’ malgre ses nombreuses imperfections n’est pas moins, pour son Bpoque un rkmarquable monunient de sagaciti.,” and, XVI., p. 818. I., p. 117. a D’Orbigny’s Christian name has been shrouded in some confusion. There is no doubt he was baptized Alcide Charles Victor Marie (XXII., p. 3; XXI., p. 434), but he adopted in his earlier works his father’s family, or rather terri- torial, name, and he describes himself as “ Alcide Dessalines d’Orbigny fils” on the labels affixed to the boxes in which his <‘RIodels ” were issued, and so signed the autograph dedication on the flyleaf of the copy of the catalogue presented by him to the Museum at La Rochelle (XXIII., p. 160). In the “ Tableau MBtho- dique ” he calls himself ” A. Dessalines d’Orb1gny ” (p. 96) and “ Dessalines d’orbigny ” (p. 245), but in the Monographs of 1839 and 1846, and in all his later geological works, he is called merely ‘L Alcide d’orbigny.” 4 XX., p. 145. ‘I XSIII., p, 170 ; E. van den Broeck. Foraminifkres de la Barbade, Brussels, 1876, p. 51. Alcide d‘orbigny. 3 before them, by Carpenter in 1862, who said : ‘‘ as his labours have contributed far more than those of all his predecessors put together, to the extension of our knowledge of the diversified forms belonging to this group, it was most unfortunate that they should have been com‘menced and carried on under the influence of views regarding the valzLe of eharaclers which have since proved to be altogether erroneous.” The fundamental errors of classification, and his riotous exuberance of nomenclature have, however, long ago ceased to be pitfalls, or even stumbling-blocks in the way of the student. Almost evcry line that he ever wrote upon the Foraminifera has been subjected to the most minute and learned examination and analysis; as we shall see, the whole of his species, with the exception of three, have been figured or d2scribed (or both), and his work stands to-day, as one of his latest biographers has said, if not as the basis, at least as the point of departure of all modern work and research upon the subject.2 The Memoir which follows was originally undertaken under the impression that it might be completed within the recognized compass of a €’residential Address. But very soon I realized that to do anything approaching justice to the task which I had undertaken, the limits I: had set myself must be very widely expanded. For many years the somewhat nebulous personality of Alcide d’0rbigny has exercised a significant fascination for me, and I found that I had collected a far larger mass of data and documents than I had any idea of. ‘‘ Bonum est cribrare modium sabuli ut quis inveniat imam margaritam ”-with these words quoted from Averrogs, Benvennto da Imola coinmsnces his Commentary upon the Paradiso of Dante,3 and such pearls as I have extracted from many “modia” of sand, are collected in something approaching to order in the following pages. I.-EARLY YEARSAND STUDIESkr LA ROCHELLE. Alcide d’Orbigny was born on September 6, 1802, at Coueron (Loire Inf.). His father, Charles Marie 1)essalines d’orbigny, was of West Indian origin, and has been traditionally, but erroneously, reported to have been a ‘(descendant ’) of Dessalines, the notorious rebel-chief of San Do11iingo.~ He was born in 1770 (January 2) on board ship whilst his parents were travelling to that Island from St. Malo, and his birth was registered at Port Malo in San XVII., p. 5. XXIII., p. 170. Commentum in, Dentis Corncediam, Vernon and Lacaita’s ed., Florence, 5 vol. (1887), iv., p. 291. See Appendix A for the origin of this legend, and the history of the family. B2 4 Tmi~suctioiuof cke Society. Doming0.l (See Appendix A.) He was sent to France to be educated, and so escaped the massacre by which his parents and sixteen brothers and sisters perished in the insurrection of the slaves, and at the age of fifteen he became assistant in surgery on board the ( Ariel’ and the (Reflhchie’ in the French navy, and later we find him working as a naval surgeon attached to the port of Brest, and the naval hospitals of Lorrent and Paimboeuf. As surgeon-major of the French Expeditionary Force to Ireland in 1798 he was attached to the hospitals for French prisoners in this country, and on his return in 1799 he married, at Paimboeuf, Marie-Anne Pipat, the mother of Alcide d‘orbigny, residing successively at Coueron (hire Tnf.) and at Noirmoutier (La VendBe). We have good reason to spare a little time to record the result of our researches into the life of‘ Charles d’Orbigny, for it is to him that the world owes the foundation of OUT study. In 1815 he removed his family and practice to Esnandes, a little village on the Anse de I’Aiguillon, 13 kil. north of La Rochelle, near the Yointe S. C16ment.2 Esnandes is a very remarkable village, consisting of hardly more than a street running up froin the Anse de YAiguillon, an immense shallow-water bay, from which, at low water, the sea recedes for miles. The local industry is the cultivation of mussels, which are grown on curious ‘(parks ” or traps, formed of faggot hurdles planted in the soft mud in the form of triangles pointing out to sea, with a small opening at the apex, across which nets are drawn as the tide recedes (Plate 11). These ‘(bonchots,” as they are locally called, beconle thickly covered with mussels, and thc ‘I boucholeurs” go out at low tide across the mud in little punts, called (‘aeons,” 2 or 3 m. in length and only 50 cm. broad, which they propel by kneeling in the (‘acon” on one knee, whilst they propel it with the other leg cased in a long boot which serves :is oar, anchor, and rudder (Plate 111). The spectacle of hundreds of these queer craft scurrying home across the mud at the turn of the tide (which conies up like a mill-race) is a most unforgettable sight.3 The elder d‘0rbigny wrote a pamphlet upon this industry of The published biographies state that he was born at St.