Baron Jan Jacob, knight commander of the Swedish order of Vasa, member of the French Legion of Honour, and of the Austrian order of Leopold, Berzelius, M.D., &c., &c. The honourable titles here enumerated can scarcely be said to add lustre to the name of this distinguished philosopher, but are creditable to the sovereigns and bodies who testified in this manner their appreciation of labours inseparably connected with the progress of physical science in the present century.

Berzelius was born August 29th 1779, at the village of Vasfunda, near Linköping in Ostrobothnia, where his father filled the humble, but in Sweden not unappreciated, office of government schoolmaster. His early acquirements and useful habits of study were formed under the care of an intelligent father. In 1796 he commenced his medical studies in the University of Upsala, where the chemical chair was then filled by Afzelius, with Ekeberg for his assistant. The account which Berzelius gave of the mode of teaching chemistry in that celebrated seminary shows how little he owed to his instructors; and contrasts very unfavourably with the practice then long established in the chemical schools of this country, when Cullen and Black had for about half a century illustrated their prelections by numerous and well-developed experiments. Berzelius stated that at Upsala the lectures were read without any experimental illustrations, and the instruction in the laboratory was of the most meagre and unsatisfactory kind.

In 1798 Berzelius quitted the university, after passing his examinations in philosophy, and became assistant to a medical practitioner at Medvi, where he soon made himself known by a masterly chemical analysis of the mineral waters of that place, which was, however, not published until he took his degree of physician, in 1804, at Upsala, where it appeared under the joint names of Berzelius and Ekeberg. Soon afterwards he gave to the world his Physical Researches on the Effect of Galvanism on Organized Bodies; a work which established his reputation as an experimental philosopher. He was now appointed the assistant and successor of Sparman as professor of medicine, botany, and chemical pharmacy; and succeeded to that chair in 1807. Berzelius at first followed the mode of teaching which he had seen at Upsala; but it appears that, on the suggestion of the late Dr Marce, who at that time visited Stockholm, he adopted the method of illustrating his lectures by experiments, and speedily found that this change gave great satisfaction to his pupils, and made him a most popular teacher of chemical science.

It was in 1806 that, in conjunction with Hissurger, he commenced the Memoirs relative to Physics, Chemistry, and Mineralogy, his numerous contributions to these sciences exhibit that marvellous ingenuity, perseverance, and accuracy in analysis, which have placed his name among the most illustrious experimental philosophers of the age. Berzelius may also be considered as the principal founder of the highly important "Medical Society of Sweden." In 1808 he became a member of the Royal Swedish Academy, and was chosen its president in 1810.

In the intervals of his public duties he paid several visits to Paris; and in 1812 was some time in London, of which visit he always spoke with much satisfaction.

In tracing his personal career, we may briefly state that in 1815 the sovereign of Sweden enrolled his name among the knights of the Order of Vasa; and in 1818 he was declared perpetual secretary of the Stockholm Academy of Sciences. In the same year, on the coronation of King Charles-John, he was ennobled; and, as a special mark of distinction, was permitted, contrary to the custom of Sweden, to retain his own name; and the title of Baron Berzelius dignified the lists of Swedish nobility. In 1821 his sovereign made him "Commander of the Order of Vasa;" and foreign princes imitated the example, by nominating Berzelius a member of "the Legion of Honour" of France, and a chevalier of "the Order of Leopold" of Austria. During all that time his very important experimental researches were never intermitted; and he devoted his vigorous mind, and uninterrupted bodily health, to the cause of science with untiring ardour. When he resigned his professorship in 1832 in favour of Mosander, he continued most ardently to pursue his refined investigations.

In 1833 Berzelius took a wife; and on that event the king of Sweden wrote him a letter, in which, among other laudatory remarks, he observed, that "Sweden and the whole world were debtors to the man whose entire life had been devoted to pursuits as useful to all as they were glorious to his native country." He also about the same time received a gratifying and valuable testimony to his important services to the arts of his country from the directors of the Swedish iron works, who, in grateful acknowledgment of the light his researches had thrown on their art, conferred on him a pension for life. Among the honours conferred on him we may likewise mention, that, at a dinner given by the Academy of Sciences, of which he had been secretary for twenty-five years, the health of Berzelius was proposed by the crown prince, the chairman, who in the most complimentary terms expressed his own personal gratitude to him as the scientific instructor of his youth.

The admiration of Europe and the gratitude of his country attended him to the latest period of his life. In the midst of his fame and of his unceasing labours, Berzelius was attacked with palsy. He saw with calm resignation his mortal career closing, and strove to complete those investigations which he had commenced while his powers were yet equal to the task. His decay was gradual, without acute suffering; and he died on the 1st of August 1848, in the sixty-ninth year of his age.

The writer of this article considers it as one of the most fortunate events of his life that he had the pleasure of a personal acquaintance with this illustrious philosopher, and bears a willing testimony to the noble frankness and manly simplicity of his character. Berzelius was ever ready to impart, without ostentation, to others his vast stores of knowledge,—to assist the researches of those engaged in kindred pursuits, by his advice, by the unreserved communication of his beautiful methods of accurate investigation, the use of his laboratory, and by a kindness of manner that irresistibly won the attachment of all who approached him. His well-earned reputation elevated him above all jealousy of others; and, as has been well observed in the *Eloge de Louyet* in the Academy of Brussels, "Berzelius was jealous only for the cause of chemistry." Hence the occasional freedom of his strictures in his *Comptes Rendus Annuels*, which occasionally excited the displeasure of authors whose inaccuracies he detected or whose hypothetical views he opposed. But a man more willing to give due praise to the useful labours of others, or more free from a shadow of envy of contemporary genius, the author of this notice never yet had opportunity of knowing.

To attempt a detailed notice of his investigations and discoveries would be to review nearly the entire field of chemical science, for there are few parts of it which he has not illustrated; and we can here only notice his principal labours.

1. The volumes of the *Physical Memoirs*, during twelve years, containing forty-seven original papers by him of great importance.

2. His treatise on Chemistry, written with great clearness and precision, went through five large editions, and was on each occasion almost wholly rewritten. It will remain a monument of his industry and skill; for the researches there detailed are not copied from the writings of others, but are all either repeated or devised by himself. It is best known in the edition in eight volumes, translated into French, under his own inspection, by Es langeo, and published at Bruxelles in 1835. The last volume contains an excellent dissertation on chemical apparatus, with essays on qualitative and quantitative analyses, and the use of the blow-pipe.

3. In 1829, at the request of the Academy of Sciences, he undertook those admirable *Annual Reports on the Progress of Physics, Chemistry, and Mineralogy*, which have proved of the utmost value to the scientific world; and the want of his free but candid and judicious criticisms is felt by all engaged in such researches.

4. His mineralogical system bears the impress of his penetrating mind. Convinced that an arrangement founded on the chemical constituents of inorganic matter was the most useful and the most interesting, he considered mineral species as depending on the atomic proportions of their principal ingredients. He arranged and designated individual minerals from this circumstance, regarding the ingredients not in atomic proportions as mechanical mixtures, that might vary in their proportions without materially changing the mineral.

5. In 1807, while the beautiful atomic theory of Dalton was scarcely well known in Britain, Berzelius began his accurate researches on "Definite Proportions;" in which, extending and systematizing the experiments of Wenzel and Richter, he applied them not only to salts, earths, and metals, but to gases and to organic compounds, and thus may be said to have been most instrumental in establishing the truth of the theory of definite proportions,—for the discoverer of which he ever expressed the profoundest respect. His determination of the atomic weights of various substances has obtained the highest praise; and, among other discoveries, we owe to him the proof of the remarkable fact, that the proportion of oxygen is constant in all the neutral salts of the same acid. It was his researches that gave the first impulse to modern organic chemistry, which of late years has made remarkable progress. We also owe to him a greater number of accurate analyses than to any other chemist of our day.

6. The last work of this celebrated man which we shall mention is his *Essay on the Use of the Blow-pipe*—the most complete account of that instrument, of which he well knew the value. It has been translated into French by Fresnel, and from that language into English by Children in 1823.

BESANÇON, a city of France, capital of the department of Doubs, 45 miles east of Dijon, on the river Doubs, which flows round it on three sides. It is well protected by strong fortifications and a citadel on an almost impregnable rock. The town is in general well built; but the houses are old, and the streets narrow and gloomy. The principal buildings are, a Gothic cathedral, court-house, town-hall, royal college, arsenal, hospital with 500 beds, barracks, theatre, library of 50,000 volumes, museum, and several handsome fountains. It contains many Roman antiquities, including a triumphal arch, and the remains of an aqueduct and an amphitheatre. Besançon is the see of an archbishop, has tribunals of primary jurisdiction and commerce, and is the head court for the departments of Doubs, Jura, and Haute Saône. It possesses also a university-academy, a diocesan seminary, a royal academy of science and belles-lettres, a lyceum, an antiquarian museum, a society of agriculture and arts, and schools of medicine, artillery, and design, besides two deaf and dumb institutions. The chief branch of industry is the manufacture of watches and jewellery. There are also some considerable breweries, and manufactories of carpets, porcelain, hardware, Seltzer-water, &c. Besançon enjoys a central position for the commerce between France and Switzerland. Pop. (1851) 33,788. Long. 5.56.26. E. Lat. 47.14.12. N.

Besançon is a place of great antiquity. Under the name of Vesontio, it was held by the Romans as a fortified place in the time of Caesar. It was destroyed by Attila, and since that period has suffered many vicissitudes. Area of the arrondissement of this name, 539 square miles; pop. 109,136.