Of his early days, no more is known than the little which can be gathered from his occasional allusions to them in a treatise which he wrote on the art of pottery. It appears he was born at the beginning of the sixteenth century, in the diocese of Agen; his parents were poor, and he received in his childhood no more than a peasant's education, except that he learned to draw and paint on glass-his father being, probably, a glass-worker. "I have had no other books," said he, "than heaven and earth, which are open to all." Bernard, however, learned to read and write, and the business of a glass-painter requiring that he should copy plans and drawings, he acquired some knowledge of drawing and surveying, which he afterwards turned to excellent account. About the age of eighteen, he quitted his native hamlet, and went to make his way in the world as best he might.

Some years passed before he finally settled in the town of Saintes, it is supposed about 1538. During the intervening time he had wandered about the principal provinces of France, occasionally remaining for months, or even years, in a town where he found employment. He had seen with an observing eye the ways of men, and studied with care the works of art and monuments of antiquity that fell under his notice, cultivating the talents which nature had given him. Above all, his great love for natural history had made him a keen and intelligent student of that marvellous book which God has spread open to show forth His praises, and declare His glory to the children of men.

The attention of Palissy was particularly directed to the study of minerals and earths; and he had acquired some knowledge of chemistry-a science then but in its infancy; in short, he had learned many things, and his mind was stored with knowledge, gathered up as material for future use; but his working-days were yet to come.

Having become "a family man," Palissy was no longer free to wander about, living as he could, "from hand to mouth,”—to use an old saying of some significance. He settled himself in a cottage at Saintes, a small and ancient town in the south-west of France, and here, for a year or two, he gained a decent living for himself, his wife, and babes, by glass-painting and surveying.

And now an incident occurred which he thus tells in the treatise already spoken of. "There was shown me an earthen cup, turned and enamelled with so much beauty that, from that time, I began to think if I could discover how to make enamels, I might make earthen vessels and other things very prettily, because God had gifted me with some knowledge of drawing." At that time Palissy knew nothing of the art of pottery, and there was no man in France who could do enamelling; but, "regardless of the fact that I had no knowledge of clays," he continues, "I began to seek for the enamels as a man gropes in the dark." Accordingly, he set to work and pounded all the substances he supposed likely to serve his purpose; he purchased drugs, bought earthen pots, and built a furnace, all to

the neglect of his ordinary business, and at considerHe foresaw the task would prove a

able expense. difficult one, and that sacrifices must be made; but he heeded not poverty and pain in searching, provided he might at length succeed. What occasioned him most anxiety, and proved the greatest obstacle to his progress, was the fact that "he was intrusted with a wife and children," which rendered it impossible for him to go and learn the rudiments of the art in some shop or pottery, and he had no means for engaging servants to help him.

The first experiment proved a total failure; for want of experience he committed the grossest blunders, and reaped only disappointment as the fruit of much time, labour, and money.

Month after month he persevered, "every day pounding and grinding new materials, and consuming wood and time." It was ruinous work, and he assures us that he "fooled away in this manner several years with sorrow and sighs." The time was not, in reality, wasted; for, as has been truly said, "when men grope in the dark, it is by touching on all sides upon what they do not seek that they at length find what they desire." His narrow means, however, would not suffer him continually to go on with this profitless labour, and he determined to try a new plan, and to send the chemicals he was testing to the kiln of some potter to be burnt, thus avoiding the most expensive part of the process-the building of furnaces, and the watching and feeding them with fuel. He describes most