Harper's New Monthly Magazine, No. XXIII.—April, 1852.—Vol. IV. / None

by Various

In that rational estimate of true greatness which men are daily becoming more inclined to form, names will yet rank high as those of the benefactors of mankind, which history has too long suffered to give place to those of heroes (so called), who might be better designated as the destroyers of national prosperity, the scourges of their country. Among the names of such benefactors, that of Antoine-Augustin Parmentier well deserves to be handed down to the gratitude of posterity. He was born in the little town of Montdidier, in 1737, of poor but respectable parents; and, having lost his father before he was three years old, he was brought up altogether by his mother, a woman of considerable intelligence, and in refinement of character far beyond her station; and to her he owed much of that religious feeling and steadiness of principle which stamped such value in after-life upon the ardent disposition and spirit of enterprise which were natural to him. The good curé of the place, who had long known and esteemed his parents, had an opportunity of observing the uncommon intelligence of the boy, and undertook to teach him the rudiments of Latin. At sixteen, the young Augustin, anxious to be no longer a burden to his mother, placed himself with an apothecary of his native town; but the following year he repaired to Paris, invited thither by a relative, to study under him the profession he had chosen.

It was not long before prospects of advancement opened to the young medical student. The war of Hanover broke out, and, in 1757, Parmentier, attached to the medical staff, though in a very subordinate post, joined the army. It was not long before he had opportunity to prove his skill and zealous devotion to his duties. A dreadful epidemic appeared among the French soldiery, and tested to the utmost his unwearied activity and unceasing attention to his duties. His services were acknowledged by his being promoted to the rank of assistant-apothecary. His dauntless exposure of himself on the field of battle caused him to be five times taken prisoner—a misfortune to which he afterward often made mirthful allusion; extolling the dexterity with which the Prussian hussars had more than once stripped him, and declaring that they were the best valets de chambre he had ever met.

It was while prisoner of war on one of these occasions that Parmentier first conceived the idea which was destined to give him a claim upon the gratitude of his country. The prisoners were kept in very close confinement, and fed altogether on potatoes; but Parmentier, instead of joining his companions in misfortune in their indignant abuse of a food altogether new to them, was calmly and sensibly engaged in reflecting on the utility of the vegetable, and in inquiring into its nature, and the mode of cultivating it. We shall see how he kept the resolution he then formed of not letting it escape his memory, should he ever be permitted to revisit his native country.

Peace being declared, he was released, and came back to Paris in 1763, where he attended the Abbe Mollet's course of natural philosophy, the chemical course of the Brothers Douille, and the botanical lectures of the celebrated Bernard de Jussieu. At this time, however, his poverty was so great, that he had to endure the severest privations, to enable him to pay the necessary fees, and to purchase such books as he required, without interfering with the pecuniary aid which he felt it alike his duty and his privilege to afford his mother. In 1766, he became a candidate for a situation as medical attendant at the Hotel des Invalides, and was almost unanimously elected. In this position, he gave the utmost satisfaction; and not only did the skill he displayed obtain for him professional reputation, but his playful, yet never satirical wit, and the charm of his gentle and affectionate disposition, made him a universal favorite. He was the object of respectful attachment to the disabled veterans, and also to the good Sisters of Charity who attended the hospital. In 1769, he received, as the reward of his labors, the appointment of apothecary-in-chief, which permanently fixed him in the Hotel des Invalides. With a little more leisure, and comparative freedom from pecuniary care, came back the recollection of his former plans with regard to the potato. This now well-known and almost universally-used tubercle had been introduced into Europe from Peru early in the sixteenth century, and had at once been cultivated in Italy and Germany. Brought from Flanders into France, its culture was promoted in the southern provinces by the encouragement given by the great Turgot; but the dogged pertinacity with which ignorance so often resists the introduction of any thing new, had in every other part of the kingdom interfered with its propagation. Indeed, the popular prejudice against it was so high as to lead to the belief that it had a baleful effect on any soil in which it was planted, and produced in those who used it as food leprosy and other loathsome diseases. Such were the absurd and groundless prejudices which Parmentier had to encounter, but he prepared himself to carry on the contest with the boldness and perseverance of one who knew that, however difficult it may be to struggle with old opinions and long-established customs, yet nothing is impossible to the spirit of enterprise, guided by sound judgment, and animated by genuine philanthropy. Parmentier was not unmindful that to attain his object he would, in the first instance, need high patronage; and this patronage he sought and found in no less a personage than Louis XVI. himself. At his earnest solicitation, the monarch placed at his disposal, as a field for his experiment, fifty acres of the Plaine des Sablons. For the first time, this sterile soil was tilled by Parmentier, and the plant he so ardently desired to naturalize committed to it. In due time the long-wished-for blossoms appeared. Almost wondering at his success, Parmentier eagerly gathered a bouquet of the flowers, more precious to him than the rarest exotic in the royal gardens, and hastened to Versailles, to present them to the king. Louis accepted the offering most graciously, and, notwithstanding the satirical smiles of some of his courtiers, wore them in his button-hole.

From that hour the triumph of the potato was secured. The nobles and fine ladies, who had hitherto laughed at what they called "the poor man's monomania," now took their tone from the monarch, and flocked round the modest philanthropist with their congratulations. Guards placed round the field excited the curiosity of the people; but as this was a precaution rather against the pressure of the crowd than against its cupidity, they were withdrawn at night, and soon it was announced to Parmentier that his potatoes had been stolen. His delight at this intelligence was extreme, and he bountifully rewarded the bearer of the news; for he saw in this theft a proof of his complete success. "There can scarcely be any remaining prejudice against my poor potatoes," he said, "else they would not be stolen." A short time after he gave a dinner, every dish of which consisted of the potato disguised in some variety of form, and even the liquids used at table were extracted from it. Among other celebrated persons, Franklin and Lavoisier were present. And thus, to the persevering efforts of one individual was France indebted for a vegetable which soon took its place in the first rank of its agricultural treasures. By naturalizing the potato in that country, Parmentier diffused plenty among thousands, once the hapless victims of privation and misery during the seasons of scarcity hitherto frequently recurring to desolate its provinces.

From 1783 to 1791, Parmentier occupied himself in the publication of several works of great merit upon domestic economy and agriculture. But now came on the evil days of the Revolution. From prudence, natural inclination, and engrossment in other pursuits, Parmentier took no part in the political storm then raging. His moderation was regarded as a protest against the principles then in the ascendant. The man who had just rendered the most signal service to the people became an object of persecution to those calling themselves the friends of the people. "Talk not to me of this Parmentier," said an infuriate club orator; "he would give us nothing to eat but potatoes. I ask you, was it not he that invented them?" His name was put into the list of the suspected, and he was deprived not only of the small pension allowed him by Louis XVI., but also of his situation at the Hotel des Invalides. However, when the coalition of all Europe forced France to avail herself to the utmost of her every resource, it was found expedient to reorganize the medical department of the military hospitals, and to improve the diet of the soldiery; and Parmentier being fixed on for this difficult task, his success amply justified the choice. His reputation for skill and talent increasing with every test to which he was put, he was successively placed on the sanitary commission for the department of the Seine, and on the general committee of civil hospitals. Diplomas were sent to him by all the learned societies, and he was enrolled a member of the National Institute.

Parmentier lived throughout the period of the Empire, honored and esteemed by all classes; but, in 1813, grief for the loss of a beloved sister added to his deep dejection at the reverses of the French arms, seriously affected his health. His patriotism could not but deeply feel the evils threatening his country from foreign invasion. He became dangerously ill, and on the 13th of December the cause of social progress lost by his death one of its most zealous and enlightened promoters. In a discourse pronounced on the occasion before the Pharmaceutic Association, Cadet de Gassicour dwelt principally on the two great benefits conferred by Parmentier—the use of the potato, and the introduction of the Sirop de Raisin, thus providing, according to the benevolent boast of the philanthropist himself, "the poor man's bread, and the poor man's sugar." During his lifetime, a proposal had been made by the Minister François de Neufchateau that the potato should be called Parmentière. It is to be regretted that a proposal which would have secured a memorial as inexpensive as it was appropriate, was rejected; one which would have indissolubly linked in the minds of every Frenchman the name of the benefactor with the benefit.

THE ARTIST'S SACRIFICE.

On a cold evening in January—one of those dark and gloomy evenings which fill one with sadness—there sat watching by the bed of a sick man, in a little room on the fifth floor, a woman of about forty, and two pretty children—a boy of twelve and a little girl of eight. The exquisite neatness of the room almost concealed its wretchedness: every thing announced order and economy, but at the same time great poverty. A painted wooden bedstead, covered with coarse but clean calico sheets, blue calico curtains, four chairs, a straw arm-chair, a high desk of dark wood, with a few books and boxes placed on shelves, composed the entire furniture of the room. And yet the man who lay on that wretched bed, whose pallid cheek, and harsh, incessant cough, foretold the approach of death, was one of the brightest ornaments of our literature. His historical works had won for him a European celebrity, his writings having been translated into all the modern languages; yet he had always remained poor, because his devotion to science had prevented him from devoting a sufficient portion of his time to productive labor.

An unfinished piece of costly embroidery thrown on a little stand near the bed, another piece of a less costly kind, but yet too luxurious to be intended for the use of this poor family, showed that his wife and daughter—this gentle child, whose large dark eyes were so full of sadness—endeavored by the work of their hands to make up for the unproductiveness of his efforts. The sick man slept, and the mother, taking away the lamp and the pieces of embroidery, went with her children into the adjoining room, which served both as ante-chamber and dining-room: she seated herself at the table, and took up her work with a sad and abstracted air; then observing her little daughter doing the same thing cheerfully, and her son industriously coloring some prints destined for a book of fashions, she embraced them; and raising her tearful eyes toward heaven, she seemed to be thanking the Almighty, and, in the midst of her affliction, to be filled with gratitude to Him who had blessed her with such children.