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    ( 333 )

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    XLIX.—A LEARNED LADY.

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    At a recent meeting of the AcademiG des ...

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    ( 333 )

    ( 333 )

    Xlix.—A Learned Lady.

    XLIX . —A LEARNED LADY . _~*<&—

    At A Recent Meeting Of The Academig Des ...

    At a recent meeting of the AcademiG des Sciences of Paris , M . Bertrand and M . Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire presented to tlieir fellow

    offering acadeinieans 1 of the a relative niodest- s lo of oking their portfolio deceased fille writer d with , to , papers the learned ; the

    body . . This offering was received by the Academy with great respect and interestand "was ordered to be carefully preserved _,

    , among the archives of the institution . The papers in question , which had been collected with great

    care for the accetance of the Academiewere the oriinal manuscripts of the works p of Mademoiselle Sop _^ hie Germain . g

    Fearing that these interesting relics might be lost or destroyed if to they present remained them in to the the hands _^ Icademie of her as their family safe , the and latter natural had determined guardian .

    " And who , " I fancy I hear some of my readers exclaiming , " who was Mademoiselle Sophie Germain ?"

    Mademoiselle Sophie Germain , Oh beloved , but , on this particular point , too ignorant readers ! was a distinguished mathematician ,

    whose life was devoted , with entire success , to the study of the hi among gher branche the other s of sex a , science and which whose is devotees still more are rarel comparativel y regarded y with rare _,

    interest She was among born her in own Pari . s , on the 1 st of April , 1776 ; being

    apparentl been ing auguries inclined y predestined the to draw mauvais to from disappoint p that laisan date ts most of ; and her sign parents died ally in whatever ' her circle native may unflatter city have in

    -1831 , in the fifty-fifth year of her age . si Up of to the tlie vocation age of thirteen by which . Sophie she seems was afterwards to have given distinguished no especial .

    She gn appears to have gone through tlie usual stages of childhood in childhood ' s usual passing like all other little irlsfrom bibs

    to pinafores , and thence way ; through the phase trousers and g short , frocks , to that of incipient young-ladyhood , with its long" frocks and

    turnedto up meet hair . with But a at this of period Montuala of her ' s exist ' * Hist ence ory , the of Mathematics young girl chanced ; " an

    event which decided copy tlie course of her life from that hour forward . Ihe taste for mathematical inquiry awakened in her mind by the

    perusal all interest of this in work every was other so subject strong , that and she could seemed not , thenceforth at once to lose , be

    induced to take the slightest interest in any other pursuit . Her means family opposed in their the carry and ing did out their of her utmost new-developed by preventing tastes her by every from

    field gaining of stud access y which to power books they , on regarded mathematical as utterl s y ubj forei , ects gn , to to force the female her from mind a .

    But she contrived to possess herself of a copy of Bezout ; and , with ..

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Jan. 1, 1860, page 333, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01011860/page/45/