René Louiche DESFONTAINES (1750-1833), French... - Lot 22 - Conan Belleville Hôtel d'Ainay

Lot 22
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René Louiche DESFONTAINES (1750-1833), French... - Lot 22 - Conan Belleville Hôtel d'Ainay
René Louiche DESFONTAINES (1750-1833), French botanist, holder of the chair of botany at the Museum of Natural History from 1793 to 1833, then director of the Museum. L.A.S. addressed to the naturalist Joseph Philippe François Deleuze (1753-1835), at the Jardin du Roi. Paris, October 6, 1826. 2 pp. in-4. Address on the back of the second leaf. Mention of answer dated October 16. Desfontaines is annoyed by a denunciation of Cuvier, about the herbarium of the great Swiss naturalist, Albrecht von HALLER (1708-1777) and affirms that this attribution is false: "[...] I am obliged to make a trip to Brittany for an important business, please watch over my house, during my absence, open the letters which will be addressed to me, and answer in my name [this directive is repeated in the address]. Mr. Cuvier, having been in the last few days in the upper room of our laboratory where Haller's so-called herbarium is located, complained in my absence to the administration that we had left this herbarium abandoned. Tell him that this herbarium is no good for anything, that we had left it where he saw it while waiting for a place to be found in our laboratory, this herbarium had been brought from Italy, it is out of order, the samples are very bad, they are badly labelled. The handwriting is not that of Haller and it is very doubtful that it is that of this famous man. However, as you know, we had planned to give him a place [...]". Haller's herbarium, composed of 59 volumes, is kept at the Museum of Natural History in Paris.
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