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had never been done Saussure visited England in to him the words in his house and probably
before: the strata, the type 1768 and, after meeting "geology", "mineralogy", owed his life to the fact that
of rock, the fossils and inin- Benjamin Franklin in "serac" [ice pinnacle] and 12,000 troops outside the
erals they contaiiied. He London, introduced the "moraine", first appeamg city's gates were ready to
measured the temperature, lightening conductor to in his books in the 1780s. intervene on his behalf.
coiu'se and flow of rivers, Geneva-regarded with He was the first person to
glaciers and lakes. great alarm by the local observe that Alpine valleys Since his early 30s
population. were U-shaped, although Saussure had suffered from
How exactly were the Alps he never realized that they sore throats and chronic
created? How did the rocks Horace-B6n6dict's wife, had been carved by digestive problems. By the
come to be folded? Why Albertine Boissier, came glaciers. He also believed 1790s both his health and
are the glaciers there? The from a distinguished family wrongly that the cente of his finances began to fail
fact that glaciers existed in of Genevan bankers. They the Earth was cold. seriously. He died in
the high mountains came as and their children lived in a Geneva in January 1799
a revelation to many peo- town house in Gerieva and Saussure was active in the and was buried at
ple. Nobody had ever asked an elegant villa borde*g political sphere too. He Plainpalais. In those days it
these questions before and the lake at Genthod, which vainly put forward a was forbidden to erect
Saussure was deterininedto can still be seen today. The proposal making education gravestones, so his grave,
find the scientific answer letters that Saussure wrote available to the lower like that of Jean Calvin, is
(see box). to his wife while explomg classes. In 1772 he founded lost.
the Alps are masterpieces the Soci6t6 pour
He invented and perfected of charm and tenderness. lAvancementdesAi'ts etde
many early fonris of l'Ayiculfuie dedicated to
sciei'itific instnunents, such Between the 1 760s and the promoting the Geneva HAYWARD BEYWOOD

as the hygrometer for the 1790s Saussure crossed the econoiny. As a highly
liumidity of the air and the Alps on fourteen geological respectedpublic figure with
anemometer for the wind expeditions. He published a strong sense of duty, in
speed. He created all sorts the findings from some of the Genevan Revolution of
of thennometers, particu- his trips in a series of 1782 Saussure found
larly one that could be low- volumes entitled Voyages hiinself reluctantly thrust
ered to the bottom of deep dans les Alpes. He was in into the limelight as a
lakes but would maintain no way a mountain climber spokesman for the
its reading while being and only went where he aristocracy. Subsequently,
hauled to the surface. could walk or ride. We owe he had to barricade himself

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